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MANUAL OF 



ENGLISH LITERATURE: 



1 le^t-ioo^ foil %thol§ and tolkg^^. 







BY 



JOHN S. HART, LL.D., 

PROFESSOR OF RHETORIC AND OF THE EMGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE IN THE 

COLLEGE OF NEW JERSEY, AND LATE PRINCIPAL OF THE NEW JERSEY 

STATE NORMAL SCHOOL. 






i^O- 




C PHILADELPHIA: 

ELDREDGE & BROTHER, 

No, 17 North Seventh Street. 

1872. 

c 



STANDARD EDUCATIONAL WORKS. 



JOHN S. HART, LL.D. 



Pirst Lessons in Oomposition. 
Composition and Khetoric. 
Englisli Litera^tiire. 
American Literature. In Preparation 






-^' 



>^0^ 

l!) Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S72, by 

ELDREDGE & BROTHER, 

in the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 

:^ 
-f^^^ <$,:^u^. . 



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■t^^'* J. FAGAN & SON, *^| 

ELECTROTYPERS, PHILAD'A. ^Jt 



LC Control Niimber 




tmp96 031586 




CaXTON press of SnEEMAX & CO. 




Preface, 



FTTHIS work is intended to serve the double purpose of a Text-book 
-*- and a book of reference. 

As a Text-book, the whole of it should be read by the student, but 
that part only which is in the larger type should be made the subject 
of recitation. By adhering to this rule, the student, even with the 
very limited time given to the pursuit in our institutions of learning, 
will be able without difficulty to compass the whole subject of English 
Literature, in all its departments, and, at the same time, will learn 
where to look for those minor details which, in the course of his stu- 
dies, form a frequent subject of inquiry, but with which it is not neces- 
sary or expedient, in ordinary cases, to burden the memory. 

As a book of reference, the amount of valuable information which 
the work contains will be found large beyond precedent in any man- 
ual of instruction that exists in the language. The facts here col- 
lected and condensed, if spread out in the usual form, would fill two 
or three octavo volumes. The items which make up this large aggre- 
gate have the advantage of being arranged in systematic order and 
in their appropriate historical connection. At the same time, by 
means of a copious verbal Index, each item may be referred to as 
readily as if the whole were in the form of a dictionary. 

It will be obvious, from the barest inspection of the volume, that the 
subject has not been considered in that restricted view which lias been 
too much the Avont in works of this kind. The Literature of a peo- 
ple contains something more, surely, than poetry, plays, and romances. 
1^- ^ . ^ 



VI PEEFACE. 

^Vhatever makes a part of popular reading, and influences tlierebv, to 
any considerable extent, the opinions and the actions of men, is a 
part of the national literature. It does not include strictly professional 
works, or works on pure science, the use of which is necessarily 
restricted to a select few ; but it does include, most assuredly, works 
on religion and morality, which concern all men alike. It includes 
school-books and other books for the young, the fugitive tract, the 
daily and weekly newspaper, secular and religious, and periodical 
literature in all its forms, as well as the ponderous tomes that fill the 
shelves of the public library. 

It is not pretended, of course, that all these topics are here treated 
exhaustively. The field of English Literature is practically without 
limit. A work in twenty volumes would not exhaust it. Yet the 
reader of the present treatise will, it is believed, get a fair and sym- 
metrical view of the whole subject, in all its departments, and through 
its whole range, from the simple rhyming chronicle of the semi-Saxon 
age down to the "In Memoriam of Temiyson" and the thundering 
periods of the London Times. 

A single word in reference to the method of grouping here 
pursued. 

In any grouping that can be made, some incongruities will neces- 
sarily occur. An arrangement by centuries is, of all arrangements, 
the one most arbitrary and objectionable. A far better and more 
common plan is to associate authors with some conspicuous reign or 
other great public event. The obvious reason for this is that the 
authors thus grouped together were subject in some measure to the 
same educational and political influences. They lived in the same 
moral atmosphere, and hence partake to some extent of the same 
general character. It has been deemed advisable, therefore, in con- 
nection with most of the chapters, to indicate briefly the reigns and the 
great political events and personages with which each group of authors 
stands most nearly related. It has been judged best, also, so far as 
practicable, to group the main body of authors around some one great 
author who stands most conspicuously connected with that period of 
history. Minor juxtapositions follow, poets being grouped with poets, 



PREFACE. Vll 

historians 'svitli historians, tlieologians with theologians, and so on. 
Bj following this course, two advantages are secured. The memory is 
aided. The authors themselves, when thus presented in their natural 
connections, are better understood. 

In collecting materials for this work, besides a diligent use of the 
many printed volumes on the subject, the mere enumeration of which 
would fill several pages, I have had special assistance from various 
quarters, which it is proper that I should specifically acknowledge, 

Asa I. Fish, Esq., of Philadelphia, has given me the unrestricted use 
of his rare and costly collection of books on early English literature. 

On the subject of the English Version of the Bible, I have had 
valuable suggestions from Eev. C. P. Krauth, D. D., Professor in the 
University of Pennsylvania, besides the free use of his exceedingly 
valuable and rare collection of books on that subject. 

I am under similar obligations to Bishops AVhittingham of Mary- 
land, Odenheimer of Xew Jersey, and Stevens of Pennsylvania, all 
eminent as liturgLsts, for valuable suggestions and the free use of their 
collections, in preparing the portion of the work relating to the Book 
of Common Prayer. 

The Eev. Frederic M. Bird, of Spottswood, New Jersey, who has 
spent many years in a special study of English Hymnody, and who 
has probably the most complete collection of books on that subject iu 
the United States, has placed his treasures most freely and generously 
at my disposal. 

Mr. Gregory B. Keen, Professor in the College of St. Cbarles Borro- 
meo, Philadelphia, has given me valuable aid in collecting materials 
respecting Catholic writers, in regard to whom, from his position, he 
has had special facilities for obtaining information. 

The Eev. John S. Stone, D. D., Senior Professor in the Episcopal 
Theological Seminary at Cambridge, Mass., has had the kindness to 
read the proof-sheets of the work for the purpose of textual criticism. 

I have also received at every step valuable suggestions from Pro- 
fessor Samuel Henry Dickson, of the Jefferson Medical School, Phila- 
delphia. 

The materials for the sketches of writers still living, containing 



via 



PREFACE 



faxits not before given to the public, liave in many instances been 
obtained direct from persons in England, whose names, however, 1 
am not at liberty to communicate. 

Lastly, and more than to any one else, I am indebted to my son, 
Prof. James Morgan Hart, of Cornell University, who iias aided me 
directly in the composition of the work, and has written a large num- 
ber of the articles. 

J. S. H. 

Princeton, N. J., Jan., 1872. 





PAGE 

PREFACE, - . ... .3 



CHAPTER I. 

Knglish before Chaucer. 

Introductory Remarks, ......... 25 

The Brut of Layamon, ........ 27 

The Ormuluni, .......... 29 

The Ancren Riwle, Robert of Gloucester, ...... 30 

Robert of Brunne, The Metrical Romances, . . . . . .31 

Extract from Layamon, ........ 32 



CHAPTER II. 

Chaucer and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, . . ' . . . ' . . ■ . .35 

Chaucer, . . . . . . , . . . .35 

Grower, ........... 39 

Piers Plowman, . . . . . . . . . 41 

Wyckliffe, .43 

Maudeville, Extract from Piers Plowman, ...... 45 

Extract from Chaucer, . . . . . . , ... 46 



CHAPTER III. 

Early Scotch Poets. 

Introductory Remarks, . . .' . . . . . .47 

Barbour, .......... 47 

Wyntoun, James I. of Scotland, . . . . . . .48 

Blind Harry, . 49 



X CONTENTS. 

PAGE 
Henryson, Dunbar, . . . . . • • . .50 

Gawin Douglas, . . . . ... . . .51 

Lindsay, ........... 52 

CHAPTER IV. 

From Chaucer to Spenser. 

Introductory Remarks, . . . . . . . . ,53 

Caxton, Sir Thomas More, ........ 54 

Skelton, Latimer, Cavendish, . . . . . . . .56 

Berners, Barclay, ......... 57 

Wyatt, Surrey, . ... . . ' . . . . .58 

Tusser, Harrington, ......... 59 

Leland, Elyot, Bale, 60 

Extract from Latimer, ........ 61 



CHAPTER V. 

Spenser and Contemporary Poets. 

Introductory Remarks, ......... 63 

Spenser, . . . . . . . . . .03 

Sidney, ........... 65 

Countess of Pembroke, . ... . . . . .67 

Lord Brooke, Gabi'iel Harvey, Raleigh, . . . . . .68 

Sackville, Ferrers, . , . . . . ... .70 

Baldwin, Warner, Southwell, . . . . . . . .71 

Daniel, . . . . . . . . . ... 72 

Drayton, Fairfax, Overbury, . . . . . . . .73 

Wotton, Barnes, Barnfield, Sylvester, ...... 74 

Browne, Rowlands, Giles and Phineas Fletcher, . . . . .75 

Herbert, Drummond of Hawthornden, ...... 76 

Extract from Southwell, . . . . . . . . .77 

Extract from Wotton, . . - . . . . . . .78 



CHAPTER VI. 

Shakespeare and the Early Dramatists. 

Rise of the English Drama, . . . . . . . .79 

Edwards, Gascoigne, Lyly, Nash, ....... 81 

Greene, . ; . . , . . .~ . • .82 

Marlowe, Lodge, Peele, . . . . , . . .83 

Chettle, Kyd, Armyn, ......... 84 

Shakespeare, .......... 84 

Ben Jonson, . . •, , , . , , ,88 

Beaumont and Fletcher, ........ 90 

Chapman, Middleton, Marston, ..,.,,, 92 



CONTENTS. XI 

PAGE 

Decker, Webster, ......... 93 

Massinger, Rowley, Ford, ........ 94 

Haywood, .......... 95 

Randolph, Shirley, 96 

Extract from Beaumont and Fletcher, ...... 97 

Extract from Shakespeare, ........ 98 

CHAPTER VII. 

Bacon and Contemporary Prose Vv^riters. 

Introductory Remarks, . . . . . . . . .99 

Bacon, ........... 99 

Roger Ascham, . . . . . . . . . . 101 

Scott, Wilson, . . . . . . . . . .102 

Meres, Florio, Digges, Napier, ........ 103 

Sir John Davies, Sir Henry Saville, ....... 104 

Annie Bacon, Ph. HoHand, Burton, Herbert of Cherbury, Sir Richard Baker, . 105 
Spotiswood, Capt. John Smith, ....... 106 

Sherley Brothers, Sandys, . . . . . . . .107 

Coryat, Davis, Hakluyt, ........ 108 

Purchas, Stow, Camden, Cotton, ....... 109 

Knox, Jewel, .......... 110 

Whittingham, Fox, Sanders, ........ Ill 

Parsons, Stanihurst, Pitts, James I., Aylmer, ..... 112 

Hooker, Bancroft, .......... 113 

Broughton. Field, Rainolds, Miles Smith, Abbot, Bilson, Boys, . . . 114 

CHAPTER VIII. 

The English Bible, and Other Public Stand- 
ards of Faith and Worship. 

I. — The English Bible. 

1. Wyckliffe's Version, ........ 115 

2. Tyndale's Version, ........ 116 

3. Coverdale's Version, ........ 118 

4. Matthew's Version, . . . . . . . .118 

5. The Great Bible, . . . . . . . . .119 

6. The Geneva Version, ....... 119 

7. The Bishops' Bible, . . . . . . . .121 

8. The Rheims-Douay Version, ...... l"il 

9. King James's Version, ........ 122 

II. — The English Prayer-Book. 

Its High Rank, ......... 124 

The Prymer, ' . . . . . . . . .125 

The New England Primer, ....... 125 

The First Prayer-Book of Edward VI., . . . . . .126 

The Second Prayer-Book of Edward VI., ..... 126 



Xll 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

The Prayer-Book of 1559, . . . . . . . .126 

Authorship of particular Prayers, . . ... . . 126 

III.— The Shorter Catechism. 

Various Documents put forth by the Westminster Assembly of Divines, 128 

Authorship of the Shorter Catechism, ..... 129 

rv. — English Htmnodt. 

Development of the Subject produced by the Reformation, . . . 129 

Influence of Luther and Calvin, ...... 131 

Sternhold and Hopkins, ........ 132 

Tate and Brady, ........ 133 

Rouse's Psalms, ......... 133 

Watts's Psalms and Hymns, ....... 133 

"VVesleyan Hymns, . . . . ■ . . ' . . . 135 

Successors to Watts and Wesley, ...... 135 

Hymnists of the Present Century, ..... .136 

Present Aspect of English Hymnody, ..... 137 

Extracts from the Successive Versions of the Bible, .... 137 



CHAPTER IX. 



Milton and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, ....... 



141 



SECTION 1.— The Poets. 



Milton, ..... 

Waller, 

Cowley, ..... 
Wither, 

Herrick, . ' . 

Suckling, . . . . . 

Butler, Carew, Davenant,. 

J. Taylor, Rouse, Ross, 

Quarles, May, Habington, 

Fanshavve, Denham, Crashaw, 

Cartwright, Lovelace, Cottt)n, Cavendish, 

Brome, Godolphin, Braithwait, . 



14G 
147 
148 
149 
150 
151 
152 
153 
154 
155 
156 



Clieveland, Annesley, 



SECTION II. — Political and Miscellaneous. 

Clarendon, .... 

Selden, Prynne, . . . . 

Whitelock, Hale, 

Goodwin, Harrington, Feltham, Godolphin, 

Petty, Hobbes, .... 

Sir Thomas Browne, Bishop Wilkins, 

Digby, T. White, 

Charles I., Vane, Woodhead, 

Marvell, Izaak Walton, 

J. Howell, Stanley, Edward and John Phillips, 



156 
15S 
159 
160 
161 
162 
163 
164 
165 
166 



CONTENTS. Xlll 

PAGE 
Blount, Carey, Ogilby, . . . . . . . . .167 

Dugdale, Pakington, Atkyns, . . . . . . . . 168 

SECTION III.— Writers of the Established Church. 

Bishop Hall, 168 

Usher, 169 

Fuller, . . 170 

Jeremy Taylor, .......... 171 

Pearson, ........... 173 

Cudworth, Barrow, ......... 174 

Cosin, Williams, Heylin, ... ...... 175 

Chillingworth, Hammond, Bramhall, Gauden, W. Gouge, . . . 176 

T. Gouge, Thorudike, More, Claggett, . . . . . . .177 

SECTION IV. — Non-Conformist ^Writers. 

Baxter, ........... 177 

Owen, 178 

Bunyan, ........... 179 

Howe, 180 

Poole, 181 

Rutherford, Calamy, Twisse, Charnock. ...... 182 

Alleine, Bates, Gillespie, Calderwood, Caryl, Burton, Byfield, Reynolds, , 183 

Ainsworth, Bridge, Brookes, Clarke, Goodwin, Manton, Biddle, . , . 184 

CHAPTER X. 
Dryden and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, . . . . . . . . 185 

SECTION I.— The Poets. 

Dryden, 185 

Roscommon, . . . . . , . . , . 188 

Earls of Orrery, Dorset, Rochester, and Devonshire, ..... 189 

Etheridge, Killigrew, Vaughan, Beaumont, ..... 190 

Brady, Pomfret, Creech, Philips, Brown, Otway, ..... 191 

Shadwell, Lee, Sedley, Elecknoe, . . . . . . . 192 

Banks, Mrs. Behn, . , . . . . . . . .193 

SECTION II. — Philosophical and Miscellaneous. 

Locke, ........... 193 

Boyle, ' . . : .195 

Temple, . 196 

Algernon Sidney, Evelyn, ........ 197 

Ray, Wallis, Pepys, ......... 198 

L'Estrange, Chamberlayne, Morland, ....... 199 

Mackenzie, Atkyns, Eachard, Glanville, Ilickes, ..... 200 

Fletcher of Saltoun, Burnet, Drake, Palmer, Blount, Dampier, Brady, Aubrey, . 201 
Ashmole, Anthony a Wood, ......... .203 

2 



XIV CONTENTS. 

SECTION III. — Theological Writers. 

PAGE 

Tillotson, ........... 202 

South, Stillingfleet, Beveridge, . . . . . . . 203 

Ken, Gale, Flavel, Patrick, Prideaux, . . . . . , .204 

Shuckford, Whitby, Burnet, Bull, Matthew Henry, . . . .205 

Comber, Croft, Edwards, Hopkins, Cradock, Assheton, .... 206 

Barnes, Doolittle, Gother, Keach, Ward, Wall, . . . . .207 

SECTION IV. — The Early Friends. 

George Fox, Barclay, ......... 208 

William Penn, 210 

Penington, Whitehead, Elwood. ........ 211 

Sewel, Burrough, ......... 212 

CHAPTER XL 
Pope and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, ......... 213 

SECTION I.— The Poets. 

Pope, ........... 213 

Prior, Gay, ........... 216 

Ambrose Philips, ......... 217 

Parnell, Howe, .......... 218 

Thomson, Blackmore, ...,,.... 219 

Tickell, Savage, .... ...... 220 

Blair, Hughes, Granville, Walsh, Fenton, ...... 221 

Garth, West, Broome, Browne, Cooke, . . . . . . . 222 

SECTION II.— The Dramatists. 

Wycherley, ........... 223 

Congreve, Vanbrugh, ......... 225 

Farquhar, Cibber, . . . . . . . . . . 226 

Mrs. Charke, D'.Urfey, Southerne, Dennis, . . . . . .227 

Mrs. Centlivre, Mrs. Cockburn, Dodsley, Jeremy Collier, . . . .228 

SECTION III.— The Prose Writers. 

Addison, ........... 229 

Steele, ........... 230 

Swift, 232 

Arbuthnot, Shaftesbury, ........ 234 

I'.olingbroke, .......... 235 

Atterbury, .......... 236 

Berkeley, ........... 237 

Somers, Pulteney, ......... 238 

Bontley, 239 

C. Boyle, Middleton, ......... 240 

l>f' I'^oo, . . . . , . . . , , .241 



CONTENTS 



XV 



Wollaston, Samuel Clarke, Norris, . 
Hutchinson, Wilson, .... 

llutcheson. Hartley, Newton, Whiston, 

Forbes, Asgill, Collins, Toland, Tindal, . 

Davenant, Mrs. Mary Astell, Mrs. Rowe. 

De Mandeville, Richardson, Theobald, Hill, Sprat, 

Sheffield, Ockley, Oldmixon, Salmon, Wodrow, Carte, 

Sale, Si^elman, Potter, Ainsworth, Bailej', 

Echard, Ames, Baker, Lewis, .... 

Chardin, Whiting, Dunton, Cave, Moore, Wotton, 
Bishop Wilson, ...... 

Rymer, Harris, Ephraim Chambers, 



PAGE 

242 
. 243 

244 
. 245 

246 
. 247 

248 
. 249 

250 
.251 

252 
. 253 



SECTION IV. —Theological Writers. 

Butler, 253 

Leslie, Sherlock, . . . . . . . . . 254 

Seeker, Stackhouse, Strype, Wake, Fleetwood, Kennett, Balguy, , . . 255 

Bampton, Arnald, Bennett, Waterland, Bingham, Dodwell, . . . 256 

Delany, Doddridge, .......... 257 

Cave, Leland, S. Browne, Grove, Halyburton, Delaune, .... 258 

Bennet, Ridgley, Neal, Boston, Abernethy, Benson, Chandler, . . . 259 

Foster, Barrington, Claridge, Dodd, Chubb, Evelyn, Taylor, . , . 260 



CHAPTER XII. 



Dr. Johnson and His Contemporaries. 



Introductory Remarks, 



261 



SECTION I. — Miscellaneous Prose ^Vriters. 

Dr. Johnson, . . . . • . 

Boswell, Burke, ..... 
Fox, ....... 



Lord Chesterfield, Sir Philip Francis, Junius, 
Lord Mansfield, .... 
Blackstone, Pitt, Hume, 
Gibbon, ..... 
Robertson, . . . . . 

R. Watson, Macphersou, . 
Hawkesworth, Hawkins, 
Reynolds, Horace Walpole, 

Wilkes, 

Ralph, Tucker, .... 

Jenyus, Kames, Harris, 

Fordyce, J. Brown, Hill, Spence, Tyrwhitt, 

T. Leland, Smart, W. Smith, Melmoth, 

Logan, G. Stuart, Lyttletou, 

Psalmanazar, Elizabeth Carter, 

Lady Mary Montagu, Elizabeth Montagu, 

Hester Chapone, Sir James Porter, Baron Munchausen, 



261 
265 
268 
269 
270 
271 
272 
275 
277 
278 
279 
280 
281 
282 
283 
284 
285 
286 
287 
288 



XVI 



CONTENTS. 



PAGB 

J. Scott, E.Wood, Anson, Bell, Capt. Cook, Dalrymple, . . . .289 

Bruce, Edmondson, Ayluffe, Oldys, . . . . . . . 290 

Farmer, Fell, Erougliton, Blackwell, Baxter, Lauder, W. Baker, H. Baker, Edwards 291 
Burgh, Jennings, Guthrie, Rolt, Ferguson, . . . . . . 292 

Davies, Chetwood, Campbell, Birch, Ballard, ..... 293 

Dihvorth, Entinck, Nugent. Kenrick, Ash, ...... 294 

SJiaJcespearian Editors: Ca-pell, Steepens, 'Maloue, Reed, . . . .294,295 

SECTION II.— The Novelists. 

Richardson, ........... 295 

Fielding, 296 

Smollett, 298 

Sterne, . . . . . . . . . . .300 

SECTION III. —The Poets. 

Goldsmith, .......... 301 

Gray, . . . . . 305 

Mason, . . . . . . . . . . .306 

Green, Dyer, Collins, . . . . . . . . .307 

Shenstone, Akenside, Churchill, ■ . . . . . . 308 

Ramsay, . . . . . . . , . . . 309 

Young, ........... 310 

Byrom, . . . . . . . . . . .311 

Anne Steele, Falconer, Armstrong, .....',. 312 

Anstey, Thornton, Carey, Whitehead, Mallet, . . . . . .313 

Wilkie, McDonald, Mickle, Scott, Brooke, ...... 314 

Mrs. Brooke, Fergusson, Chatterton, ....... 315 



SECTION IV. - Theological Writers. 



Warburton, ...... 

Lowth, ....... 

Bate, Dodd, Hervey, W. Law, .... 

E. Law, Newton, Erskine, ..... 

Robinson, Cruden, Farmer. Gill, 

Brown, Orton, Lardner, Pike, Mason, Ilanncr, Elackburne, Chapman, 

Bentham, Jortin, Adams, Sandeman, Challoner, . 

Alban Butler, Archer, Phillips, .... 

Extracts from Sir Thomas Browne and Akenside, . 



316 
317 
318 



320 
321 
322 
323 
324 



CHAPTER XIII. 



Cowper and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, ........ 325 

SECTION L — The Poets. 

Cowjjor, ........... 326 

Newton, ........... 327 



CONTENTS, 



XVll 



Darwin, Beattie, . . . . 

Burns, Blacklock, ...... 

Grahame, ....... 

Cumberland) Peter Pindar, ..... 

Mrs. luchbald, Mrs. Cowlej', Mrs. Tighe, 

Lady Anne Barnard, Dermody, Z\Iurpliy, Pye, Holcroft, Gali, 

Hoole, Boscawe'n, Dibdiu, Kemble, 



329 
330 
331 
332 
333 
334 



SECTION 

Slieridan, 
Garrick, Foote, 
Colman, Glover, Home, 
Bickerstaff, Bishop, 



II. —The Dramatists. 



. 33G 
337 



SECTION III.— Miscellaneous Prose Writers. 

Hannah More, .......... 338 

Mrs. Piozzi, Madame D'Arblay, ....... 339 

Burney, . . . . . " . . . . . .340 

Mrs. Kadcliffe, Mrs. Lennox, ........ 341 

Elizabeth Hamilton, Charlotte Smith, Lady Fenn, Sir John Fenn, . . . 342 

Mrs. Trimmei-, Catharine Macaulay, Aulay Macaulay, Mackenzie, . . 343 

Smellie, Tytler, Howard, Thomas Paine, ...... 344 

Godwin, 345 

Mary Wollstonecraft, . . . " . . . . . . 347 

Tone, De Lolme, Day, Miller, ........ 348 

Pownall, Sharp, Liverpool, Wyndham, ....... 349 

Grattan, Adam Smith, ..... 

Priestley, ........ 



Horsley, ........ 

Price, Paley, ....... 

Reid, Ferguson, Balfour, ..... 

Blair, Campbell, ....... 

Gerard, Monboddo, Home Tooke, W. Tooke, 
T. Wart on, J. Wharton, Sir William Jones, 
Eitson, Percy, ....... 

Wakefield, Hayley, 

Person, Potter, Stuart and Revett, Bryant, . 

Blayney, Elphiuston, Walker, ..... 

Lindley Murray, ...... 

Henry, Russell, Tytler, Gilpin, ..... 

White, Young, Orme, Forbes, .... 

Foster, Hanway, Vancouver, Pennant, Cavendish, Abercrombie, 

Hutton, Beloe, Towers, Bisset, Arrowsmith, 

Adam, Enfield, Berkenhout, Ellis, Gough, 

Grose, Manrice, Pegge, Strutt, Ayscough, . 

Astle, Ferriar, ....... 



350 
. 351 

352 
. 353 

354 
. 355 

856 
. 357 

358 
. 359 

360 
. 3G1 

362 
. 363 

364 
Beddoes, Moore, . 3C5 

366 
. 367 

368 
. 369 



SECTION IV.— Theological Writers. 



Tlie Wesleys, 
Whitefield, 
'2* 



369 
371 



XVlll 



CONTENTS 



^ PAGE 

Toplady, Huntington, Coke, Jones of Nayland, Gibbons, .... 372 

Hawkes, McKniglit, Williams, Hunter, . . ... . . 373 

Hej^ Home, Milner, Newcome, ........ 374 

Parkhurst, Porteus, Hurd, Romaiue, ...... 375 

Watson, Fleetwood, Cecil, Buck, Andrew Fuller, Alexander Geddes, Berington, . 376 



CHAPTER XIV. 
Sir Vv^ alter Seott and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, ......... 377 



SECTION I.- 

BjTon, ..... 

Moore, ..... 

Shelley, ..... 

Mrs. Shelley, Keats, . 

Kirke White, Campbell, . 

Rogers, ..... 

Southey, . . 

Mrs. Southey, Coleridge, • 

Hartley Coleridge, .... 

Other Coleridges, Joanna Baillie, 

Mrs. Hemans, .... 

Mrs. Grant, Elizabeth Landon, 

Crabbe, ..... 

Heber, 

Hogg, Bloomfield, .... 
PoUok, Finlay, Wiffin, . 
Sotheby, Bowles, .... 
Balfour, Colman, Boaden, O'Keefe, S. J. Arn 


-Tl' 

old, 


le P( 


Dets 




• 



377 
379 



385 
387 
389 
390 
391 
392 
393 
394 
395 
396 
397 



SECTION IL— The Novelists. 



Walter Scott, ........ 

Maria Edgeworth, ■'...... 

Richard Edgeworth, Miss Austen, ..... 

Lady Blessington, Margaret A. Power, Miss Ferrier, 

Harriet and Sophia Lee, Grace Kennedy, Lady C. Lamb, Mrs. Roche, Gait, 

Beckford, . •-...... 

31onk Lewis, Maturiu, M. Scott, ..... 



399 
401 
402 
403 
404 
405 
406 



SECTION III. — Reviewers and Political Writers. 

Oifford, •--........ 407 

Mackintosh, . . . . ... . . , 408 

Hazlitt, ••...<.,... 409 

Canning, Erskiiie, . . . . . _ ^ _ _ 4-|0 

Lord Holland, Roniilly, Sinclair, Cobbett, . . . , , .411 



CONTENTS 



XIX 



SECTION IV. — Philosophical and Scientific 
Writers. 

PAGE 

Dugald Stewart, . . . . • . . . . . .412 

Thomas Brown, .......... 413 

Abercrombie, Dymond, Di'ew, ........ 414 

John Mason Good, Olinthus Gregory, ...... 415 

Beutham, ........... 416 

Malthus, Ricardo, ......... 417 

Spurzheim, Playfair, Sir Humphry Davy, ...... 418 

Watt, Wilkins, .......... 419 

Marsden, Morrison, ......... 420 

SECTION v. — Religious and Theological Writers. 

Scott the Commentator, . . . . . . . . . 4'_'0 

Robert Hall, 421 

Edward Irving, .......... 422 

Thomson, Middletou, Tomline, ....... 423 

Adam Clarke, Henry Martyn, Ward, "Williams, Rammohun Roy, . . . 424 

Legh Richmond, Magee, Jebb, Hales, Hill, Evans, Benson, . . . 425 

Burder, Bevan, Belshara, J. Milner, C. Butler, . . . . . .426 

McGavin, 427 



SECTION VI. — Miscellaneous V/riters. 

Mrs. Barbauld, ....... 

Dr. Aikin, . " . 

Lucy Aikin, Helen Maria Williams, Anderson, Alexander Chalmers 

Sir Egerton Brydges, Nathan Drake, .... 

Charles Lamb, Cottle, ...... 

Roscoe, ........ 



George Chalmers, Mitford, Gillies, .... 

Kingsborough, Nichols, Ballantynes, Bell, ... 
Clarkson, Colton, Dallas, Leyden, . ... 

Benger, Hope, Murphy, Northcote, . . . . 

Flaxman, Laing, Knox, MacDiarmid, . . . . 

MacNish, Medwin, Hobhouse, O'Meara, Dr. Parr, . 
Payne Knight, Gell, Elmsley, Eustace, Raffles, 
Malcolm, Percy Anecdotes, Gorton, Bryan, Lempriere Jones, Mungo 
Denham and Clapperton, Burckhardt, Lander, Clarke, Coxa, 
Inglis, Rich, Remiell, ...... 



427 
428 
429 
430 
431 
432 
433 
434 
435 
436 
437 
438 
439 
440 
441 
442 



CHAPTER XV. 

WordswoFth and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Remarks, . . . . . . . . .4 



SECTION I.— The Poets. 



Wordsworth, 

Christopher and Charles Wordsworth, 



443 
446 



XX 



CONTENTS 



Keble, .... 

Croiy, Ebenezer Elliott, 

Barham, Ingoldsby, 

Hood, Hook, 

James and Robert Montgomery, . 

Barton, Bayly, Motherwell, Praed, 

Clare, .... 



PAGE 

. 447 
448 

. 449 
45u 

. 451 
452 

. 453 



SECTION II. — Novels and Tales. 

Miss Mitford, Amelia Opie, Lady Morgan, .... 

Banim, Lady C. Bury, Ellen Pickering, Marryat, .... 

Maxwell, Borrow, . ^ ..... . 

Charlotte Bronte, ........ 



454 
455 
456 



SECTION III. 



Sydney Smith, . 

Lady Holland, 

Jeffrey, Brougham, 

Horner, Wilson, Christopher North 

James "Wilson, . 

Henrietta Wilson, De Quincey, . 

Lockhart, 

Landor,. .... 



\A/Fiters on Literature, Polities, 
and Science. 

457 
458 



Lei^h Hunt, John Foster, 
Hallam, Maginn, . 
Mahony — Father Prout, 
Horace and James Smith, Bowring, 
Cockburn, Croker, Moir, 
Prichard, Blakey, Herscliel, 
Nichol, Buckland, Hugh Miller, 
Mantell, Lardner, Thomson, Johnst 
Bell, Carpenter, Combe, Youatt, 



. 461 
462 

. 463 
464 

. 465 
466 

. 467 



470 
471 
472 
473 
474 



SECTION IV.— Writers on Religion and Theology. 

Chalmers, . . . ■ 474 

Bridgewater Treatises, Tracts for the Times, ..... 476 

Essays and Reviews, Wilberforce, ....... 477 

Samuel, Isaac, and Edward Wilberforce, ..... 478, 479 

J. Pye Smith, Simeon, Blanco White, ....... 479 

Watson, Wardlaw, McCrie, ........ 480 

Kitto, Mar.sh, Mant, D'Oyley, . . . . , . . .481 

Anderson, Blunt, Bickersteth, Bennett, Butler, Carpenter, Conder, . . 482 

Dick, Goode, Duff, Henderson, . . . . . . . .483 

Have, Conybeare. Howson, Harris, The Haldanes, ..... 484 

Giirney, Mrs. Fry, Taylor of Oiigar, . . , . . . .485 

Charles, Isaac, Ann, and .lane Taylor, ...... 486 

Jay, Mrs. Sherwood, Cljarlotte Elizabeth, . . . . . .487 

Grace Aguilar, Caroline Fry, ........ 488 



CONTENTS 



XXI 



SECTION V. — Writers on History, Biography, 
and Antiquities. 



Lingard, ........ 

Alison, ........ 

M. Russell, Allan and Peter Cunningham, A. F. Tytler, 

P. F. Tytler, rihai'on Turner, Vrilliam Smyth, 

Sir Harris Nicholas, Todd, Lord Campbell, 

Britton, Burke, Douce, Fosbrooke, H. G. Knight, . 

Singer, Dibdin, Watt, ...... 

Lowndis, Orme, Darling, Sir John Barrow, Bgechey, 
Belcher, Sir Jonn Franklin, Fraser, Capt. Hall, Buckingham, 
Bartlett, ....... 



. 490 

491 
. 492 

493 
. 494 

495 
. 496 

497 



SECTION VI. — Miscellaneous Writers. 



Arnold of Rugby, ..... 

Matthew Arnold, Alison, Taylor the Platonist, 

Taylor of Norwich, Mrs. Austin, Sterling, Ward, 

Wellington, Wellesley, 

Montagu, Loudon, Granville and John Penn, . 

Mudie, Smedley, Lady Stanhope, Miss Jewsbury, 

Hofland, Herbert, Shoberl, Hone, 

C. A. Brown, ..... 

Classical. — The Yalpys, Dyer 

Barker, Blomfield, Mitchell, F, Cary, W. S. Rose, 

Rose, Peter, Eosworth, Crabb, Crombie, 

Art- Writers. — Haydon, Eastlake, Shee, 

School-Books. — Arnold, Mavor, Maunder, Mrs. Markham, Mrs. Marcet, 

Journalists. — Blanchard, Quin, Bayley, Phillips, Dod, Baines, 



Smart, 



500 
. 501 

502 
. 503 

504 
. 504 

505 
. 506 

506 
. 507 

508 



CHAPTER XVI. 



Tennyson and His Contemporaries. 

Introductory Ptemarks, ........ 



509 



SECTION I.— The Poets 

Tennyson, ........ 

Robert Browning, .... 

Mrs. Browning, ..... 

BIrs. Norton, ..... 

Alaric Watts, Procter, " Barry Cornwall," 

Adelaide Procter, Swain, 

Bailey, Taylor, Talfourd, .... 

Aytoun, Milnes, Moxon, Eliza Cook, . 

Brooks, Patmore, Struthers, Massey, 

Mackay, Knowles, AUingham, Ilervey, 

Home, Faber, Bonar, Bickersteth, 

Charlotte Elliott, Dora Green well, Rossetti, Jean Ingelow 

Owen Meredith, Morris, ..... 

Buchanan, ..... 



, Swinburne, 



509 
511 
512 
513 
514 
515 
516 
517 
518 
519 
520 
521 
522 



XX 11 



CONTENTS. 



SECTION II.— The Novelists. 



Dickens, 



Thackeray, 

Bulwer-Lyttou, 

Disraeli — Father and Son, 

Trollope-^ Mother and Sons, 

Reade, . . , 



Mayne Reid, Kingsley, 
Hughes. . 



. 523 

524 
. 526 

527 
. 528 

530 
. 531 

532 
. 533 

534 
. 535 

536 
. 537 



Lever, ..... 

Lover, Warren, ...... 

G. P. R. James, Wilkie Collins, Ainsworth, Grattan, 

Carleton, Ritchie, Williams, Warburton, Smedley, 

Jane, Anna Maria, and Sir Robert Ker Porter, Miss Pardoe, Mrs. S. C. Hall, 

Julia Kavanagh, Katherine Thomson, Bai'oness Tautphoeus, Elizabeth Sheppard, 

Catherine Sinclair, ........ 538 

Elizabeth Sewell, Catherine Marsh, Miss Yonge, Mrs. Wood, . . . 539 

Mrs. Oliphant, Lady Fullerton, Mrs. Gore, Marian Evans, "George Eliot," . 540 

Mrs. Gaskell, Miss Muloch, ........ 541 



SECTION III. — ^V^iters on Literature and 
Polities. 



Carlyle, 

Ruskin, ..... 

Max Miiller, E. Young, 

Sir G. C. Lewis, Latham, Mure, 

Craik, J. Mill, .... 

John Stuart Mill, Wilson, 

MacCulloch, Twiss, Thompson, Gladstone, 

Senior, Cobden, Kay, Goldwin Smith, 

Stephen, Eail Russell, 

Earl of Derby, Urquhart, Tennent, . 

Eraser, Spalding, Ferrier, Dallas, Lady Eden, Dilke 

Forrester, "Alfred Crowquill," Jerrold, Lemon, 

Mrs. Jameson, . . 



541 
542 
543 
544 
545 
546 
547 
548 
549 
550 
551 
552 
553 



SECTION IV. — AVriters on Philosophy and 
Science. 



Sir William Hamilton, ..... 


. 553 


Morell, Mansel, Buckle, 


554 


Herbert Spencer, Duke of Argyle, 

Brewster, Faraday, ...... 

WheWell, Babbage, ..... 

Mrs. Somerville, Darwin, Huxley, . 

Owen, Wood, Waterton, Roget, .... 


.555 
556 

. 557 
558 

. 559 


Gosse, Lyell, Tyndall, ...... 

Forbes, D. Wilson, . . . . , 

Young the Egyptologist, . . . . 

Wilkinson, Hayman Wilson, .... 

Monier Williams, . . 


560 

. 561 

. . .562 

. 563 

... 564 



CONTENTS, 



XXlll 



SECTION v. — Writers on History, Biography^ 
Antiquities, etc. 



M9,caulay, .... 
Grote< .... 
Froude, Merivale, . 
Milman, Agues Strickland, 
Rawlinson, .... 
Pal grave, Napier, 
Lord Mahon, VanghaB, 
Thirlwall, Kinglake, . 
Helps, Finlay, Burton, Stirling, . 
Prior, Forster, Smiles, Masson, 
Lewes, Dixon, Wright, Grant, 
Thorpe, Madden, Halliwell, Dyce, 
Collier, Thorns, Sharpe, . 
"Watts, Pinkerton, 



PAGE 

. 56i 



SECTION VI. — AA/riters on Theology and 
Religion. 



J. H. Newman, ..... 

Wiseman, ..... 

Manning, ...... 

Ward, Digby, ..... 

Pusey, Isaac Williams, .... 

F. W. Newman, Rowland Williams, H. B. Wilson, 
Colenso, Baden Powell, Hampden, 
Stanley, Seeley, F. W. Robertson, 
-Thomson, Sumner, Whately, 
Faber, ...... 

Home, Trench, ..... 

Alford, Bloom field, Keith, 

Tregelles, Noel, Spurgeon, 

Winslow, Melville, James, Rogers, Philip, . 

Power, Hall, Gumming, Hamilton, 

Guthrie, Hanna, Candlish, Fairbairn, 

Tulloch, Eadie, Davidson, 



Sunday-School Books. 
Mrs. Charles — Schonberg-Cotta Series, 
Miss Manning — Mary Powell Series, 
Mrs. Anne Shepherd; A. L. 0. E. Series. 



Maurice, 



56(3 
567 
568 
569 
570 
571 
572 
573 
574 
575 
576 
577 
578 



. 579 
581 

. 582 
583 

. 584 
585 

. 586 
587 

. 588 
689 

. 590 
591 
592 
593 

. 594 
595 



597 
597 



SECTION VII. — Miscellaneous V/riters. 

The Howitts. . . . . . . . . , .597 

Robert and William Chambers, ....... COl 

Knight, Gilfillan, Tupper, . ^ 602 

Gleig, Harriet and James Martineau, ...... 603 

Fanny Kemble, Mrs. Ellis, . , . . . . . .604; 



XXIV CONTENTS. 

PAGE 
Crabb Robinson, The Brothers Mayhew, . . . . , , 605 

Mackay, Sala, Albert Smith, Thornbury, ...... 606 

Shaw, Boyd, Bayne, J. Brown, Palmer, Pillans, Angus, . . . .607 

Mrs. Clarke, Oliver, Pugin, Ferguson, . . . . . . .608 

Richardson, J. M. Kemble, Conington, ...... 609 

Jowett, Smith's Dictionaries, ....... 610 

Travels. 
Parry, Ross, Scoresby, Murray, Madden, Layard, ..... 611 

Head, Alexander, Atkinson, Wallace, Wolff, Burton, Baker, .... 612 

Speke, Livingstone, ......... 613 

Russell the Times Correspondent, . . . , , . . 613 

The London Times, •....,..,. 614 





English Literature. 



3>«^C 



CHAPTER I. 

Enqlish before Chaucer. 

English Literature, strictly speaking, does not mean 
the literature of England. 

Successive Literatures. — There have been in England several suc- 
cessive races, each having a literature of its own. 

The Welsh. — The old Celts, still represented by the "Welsh in the west of Eng- 
land, had a literature, rather extensive too, which is no more English than the He- 
brew is. Anglo-Saxon. — The Anglo-Saxons, through a period of several centuries, 
culn\inating in the time of Alfred the Great, had a literature, some of it of a high order. 
This, though nearer to the English than any of the others are, though indeed the 
parent of the EnglisVi, still is not itself English : it is Anglo-Saxon. Norman-French, 
The Normans, who settled in England in the twelfth century, brought with them a 
noble literature. But it was Norman - French, not English. Church- ILatin. — The 
ecclesiastics of the English Chiirch, from the second century, possibly fi'om the first, 
down to the time of the Reformation, and even a little later, had among them a litera- 
ture of their own, which is very copious, and some of it of a high order. But it is 
Cluuxh-Latin, not English. 

A literature is named, not from the soil on which it thrives, but 
from the language in which it is written, Hence, 

English Literature is the literature which exists in the 
English language, 

3 25 



26 ENGLISH LITEKATURE. 

What it Includes. — It includes works written by Americans, as 
well as those written by Englishmen. It includes the works even of 
foreigners, provided those works are written in the English language. 

How Divided. — For convenience of treatment, and in accordance 
with general usage, it is divided into two parts. The English works 
written in England and its dependencies are considered in the present 
volume, under the head of English Literature ; those written in the 
United States are considered in a separate volume, under the head of 
American Literature. 

To fix a precise point when English Literature may be 
said to have begun, we must first ascertain how far back 
the English Language goes. 

Note — In one sense, Language, being in a constant state of transition, has no begin- 
ning — none, that is, which may be traced to some precise point in historical times. 
And yet, if we follow any language back from its present condition through succes- 
sive changes, we find after a while, that the documents wliich appear in it are no 
longer intelligible to ordinary readers. The stream is lost. We are obliged, therefore, 
for convenience of treatment, to assume a point, somewhat arbitrarily, where the 
language, in its present form, may be said to begin. Happily, in the case of the Eng- 
lish language, historical events have defined this point more sharply than is the case 
with most languages. The Saxons in England maintained their language compara- 
tively unimpaired until the coming of the Normans, A. D. 1066. For one or two 
centuries after the coming of the Normans, a sharp conflict took place, not only be- 
tween the two races, but also between the two languages. The final result was a 
mixed race and a mixed language — predominantly Saxon, but with a large Norman 
element. * 

The mixed language resulting from the Conquest, neither 
pure Saxon, such as Alfred spoke and wrote, still less pure 
Norman-French, such as William and his barons spoke, is 
our modern English. 

Changes that took place. — In the process by which the Anglo- 
Saxon became English, two vital changes took place. 1. hoss of Inflec- 
tion. The Anglo-Saxon, like the Greek and Latin, was an inflectional 
language. In the rude jostling of Saxon and Norman speech, these 
inflections Avere forced to give way. This was the first result, and it 
was brought about mainly by the shock and violence of the Conquest. 
2. New Words. The second result, and one considerably later, was the 
introduction of foreign v.^ords. It was not until the Normans began 
to consider themselves Englishmen, and to use the language of the 
natives, that Norman words began to show themselves in any great 
abundance in Ensrlish composition. 



ENGLISH BEFOEE CHAUCER. 27 

The Precise Point. — In a change so gradual and continuous as tliat 
of the transition of a language from its ancient form to its modem 
form, it is not easy, as already stated, to fix a precise point, where it 
ceases to be one, and becomes clearly the other. But, 

The date, A. D. 1200, may be assumed as a convenient dividing line 
between the old language and the new. 

Documents written much earlier than that are either Anglo-Saxon 
or Norman-French, according to the birth and the proclivities of the 
writer ; documents later than that, very rapidly became unmistakably 
English. 

Taking this view of the subject, that is, recognizing the language as being English 
from and after the beginning of the thirteenth century, the first author in chrono- 
logical order that claims attention, is a Chronicler by the name of Layamon. 



The Brut of Layamon. 

The work of Layamon is called Brut, or more fully, 
Brutus of England. It is a chronicle of British affairs, 
from the arrival of Brutus, an imaginary son of ^neas of 
Troy, to the death of King Cadwalader, A. D. 689. 

History of the Manuscript. — The existence of this Chronicle in 
manuscript has long been known, but it has not attracted particular 
attention until quite lately. The earlier critics spoke of it slightingly. 
Extracts from it, however, were prmted from time to time, by differ- 
ent explorers, which gradually increased the public estimation of its 
merits, and, at length, in 1847, it was printed. Sir Frederick Madden 
having then brought out a splendid edition of the whole work, in 3 
vols. 8vo., for the Society of Antiquaries of London. 

Origin of the Xegrentf. — Among the old Britons in Wales and Cornwall of 
England, and in Armorica or Brittany on the coast of France, there had grown 
up a most extraordinary mass of legends in regard to the early history of the 
race. These Welshmen have always been an imaginative people, and their secluded 
condition in those early centuries favored the growth of wild imaginations. They 
were connected ecclesiastically with Rome. Some of them, who knew Latin, had 
learned enough of Virgil to know that Rome was connected somehow with Troy. 
Their legends, consequently, presented a strange jumble of facts. The great object 
of patriotic ambition with them seemed to be to trace the origin of their race back 
to ancient Troy. This floating mass of traditionary legends had been collected by 
some Celtic hand, and woven, with all possible gravity, into a formal history of 
Britain, tracing its line of monarchs back, in regular succession, to Brutus, an imagi- 
nary son of ^neas of Troy. Brutus settled in Britain, as ^neas did in Italy. Such 
was the tradition. 



28 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

Geoffrey of MonniotitJi. — An English monk, Geoffrey of Monmouth, trans- 
lated into Latin this AVelsh Chronicle, now lost. Geoffrey called his book Historia 
Britonum, A History of the Britons. It contained all sorts of incredible stories and 
fables, classical. Christian aud heathen, the ufifspriug of an imaginative people, among 
wild scenery, in an early stage of society. As history it is worthless. It torms, how- 
ever, an important link in the history of English literature, the materials of a large 
number of the earliest works that exist, both in English and in iS'ormau-French, hav- 
ing been drawn from this crude mass of fictions, misnamed history. 

Origin of the MJiytning Chroniclers. — The first writers that we may 
fairly call English, were Rhyming Chroniclers. They professed to give in metre a 
record of early British history, and the matter of their Chronicles was made up from 
these grotesque Welsh traditions, so industriously preserved by Geoffrey of Monmouth. 
They did not, however, always take their materials directly from Geoffrey. Previously 
to their time, a race of minstrels had sprung up in France, and these French poets 
were the first to avail themselves of the materials collected by Geoffrey. Within a 
very few years after the appearance of his work, they had translated these legends 
from his prose Latin to Norman French metre. Some of the English Chroniclers 
took their stories from these Norman-French poems ; some took directly fi-om the 
original Latin of Geoffrey; some took from both sources; aud all added and varied, 
each to suit his own taste and circumstances. 

Origin of Ziayamon's Chronicle. — Layamon's Chronicle, Brutus of Eng- 
land, is in the main a translation of a Chronicle of the same name, " Brut d'Angle- 
terre," by Wace, a Norman-French poet, who took the story from Geoffrey of Monmouth. 
Layamon, however, besides translating from Wace, took materials also from other 
sources, particularly from Venerable Bede, the ecclesiastical historian of Great 
Britain. 

Of Layamon himself we know nothing, except what he 
himself tells us, which is very little. He tells us that he 
was a priest, and that he resided at Ernley, near Redstone, 
in Worcestershire; and he seems to say that he was em- 
ployed in the services of the church there. 

Date of the Chronicle. — The composition of the Chronicle, Brv,tus 
of England, has been assigned, from internal evidence, to the beginning 
of the thirteenth century, — not later, probably, than the year 1205. 

Versification of the Chronicle. — The French Chronicle which Layamon 
followed was in eight-syllable rhyming couplets. Layamon's Brutus sometimes 
rhymes; as, 

— Kinges — theines — velde 

— thinges — sweines — scelde. 
Occasionally also it runs into regular octo-syllabics ; as, 

Summe heo gunnen lepen, 

Summe heo driven balles. 
There is, too, an occasional appearance of the peculiar alliteration which characterized 
the old Saxon poetry.* On the whole, it would seem that Layamon, for his versifica- 

* See Hart's Composition and Rhetoric ; subject. Versification, p. 222, 



ENGLISH BEFORE CHAUCER. 29 

tion, either followed some system of his ovrn, deijendent upon artifices which, at this 
distance, Ave cannot appreciate, — which, at any rate, we have not yet discovered, — 
or, which is probable, that he had no system of verse, but simply broke up his matter 
into short lines, like the original which he was translating, and that in so doing, he 
occasionally adopted both its metre and its rhyme. Though thus without any dis- 
coverable, or recognized, system of versification, the Brutus of Layamon has no little 
of poetic fire. 'J he passage which is q^uoted at the end of this chapter contains some- 
thing more than the creeping lines of a mere chronicler. It is the work of a creative 
imagination. It has the ring of true poetry. 

Linguistic Value of the Chronicle. — The linguistic value of Layamon's 
Brutus is very great. The Chronicle is considerable in amount, numbering 32,250 
lines; and it shows us the condition of the language in that interesting and curious 
transition stage, about midway between the pure old Saxon and the established 
modern English, having as yet adopted almost no Norman or Latin words, less than 
one hundred in the whole work, but having already lost the greater part of tha 
Saxon grammatical inflections. 

The Ormulum. 

The Ormulum is so called from its autlior, Orm, as he 
himself says, in the opeuing couplet : 

This hoc is nemned Ormulum, 
Forthy that Orm it wrote. 

Sistory of tlie Ormulum,. — The history of this work is rather curious. Only 
a single manuscript copy exists, and that apparently the original copy or auto- 
graph of the author. It was fouud at the Hague, in Holland, in 1659, among the 
books of the deceased book-collector, Tan Yliet, and was purchased by the eminent 
scholar, Francis Junius, and by him was bequeathed, among other treasures, to the 
Bodleian Library, at Oxford. It was supposed by Tan Yliet to be an old Gothic or 
Swedish manuscript. As it is not broken up into verses, it was supposed to be in prose, 
until 1775, when Tyrwhitt discovered tliat it was in verse. Since the announcement 
of this discovery, the Ormulum has attracted increasing attention, as an important 
document in early English literature: and finally, in 1852, it was printed in handsome 
style by the Oxford University press, under the editorial care of Dr. White, formerly 
Professor of Anglo-Saxon in that University. 

Suhject of the Ormultftn. — Tlie Ornnilnm is a series of Homilies, the sub- 
jects of the homilies being those portions of the New Testament appointed to be 
read in the dailj' mass service of the church. Tlie writer, Orm, first gives a paraphrastic 
version of the gospel for the day ; changing freely, and adding to, the matter, so as to 
suit his verse. He then adds an exposition. 

Date of the Ormulum. — The Ormulum was written somewhere in 
the earlv part of the thirteenth century, a little later than the Brutus 
of Layamon, perliaps about the year 1220. 

Diction, of the Ormulum. —The Ormulum, like the Brutus of Layamon, 
has almost no Norman-French words. It shows the language in tliat state in which 
the old Saxon inflections are nearly gone, the grammatical structure being almost 



30 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

identical with modern English, but foreign words have not yet begun to intrude them- 
selves. Ninety-seven per cent, of the words, according to Prof. Marsh, are of Saxon 
origin. 

Versification of the Orniulum. — The verse, in the Ormulum, does not 
rhyme, nor has it the Saxon alliteration, but it is metrical throughout, and consists 
of couplets, arranged in lines alternately of eight syllables and seven syllables, the first 
line having four exact iambics, and the second having three iambics with an additional 
shoi't syllable. Thus : 

I Now broth I er Walt er, broth jer mm, | 
I Xfter I the flesh |es kindie.* 
This metrical construction is so thoroughly maintained that the ear soon uncon- 
sciously waits for and recognizes the line pauses, with the same feeling of pleased 
expectancy with which in rhyming verse we wait for the rhyme. It is a peculiar and 
not unpleasing form of blank verse. 

The Aneren Ri^A^le. 

The title, Aneren Riwle, means "Anchoresses' Rule," — 
Aneren being the abbreviated form of the old genitive 
" Ancrena," and Biwle being the old spelling for " Rule." 

Object of the WorJc. — The Aneren Riwle is a treatise on the duties of the 
monastic life, written by an ecclesiastic, apparently one in high authority, for the 
direction of thi-ee ladies, to whom it is addressed, and who. with their domestic ser- 
vants, or lay sisters, formed the entire community of a religious house. 

Date of the Work. — The composition of the Aneren Eiwle is re- 
ferred to the same date as the Ormulum, possibly a httle later. The 
year 1225 is given as a probable conjecture. It is interesting as an 
extended specimen of prose of the same period with the two poetical 
works already noticed. 

Its Diction. — The Aneren Riwle has a larger percentage of Latin words than 
either of the two works before mentioned. This is easily explained. All the rules 
of the monastic orders, and most of the treatises then extant on religious topics, were 
in Latin. An ecclesiastic, composing a work in English for the direction of a company 
of ladies wishing to lead a recluse life, would naturally use occasionally the Latin 
terms with which he was most familiar. In other respects, the language is very much 
the same as in Layaraon and the Ormulum. 

The work was printed for the Camden Society, m 1853. 

Robert of GloLieester. 

At the distance of nearly a century from Layamon, is a 
rhyming Chronicler, Robert of Gloucester. All we know 
of him is that he was a monk of Gloucester Abbey, and as 

* See Hart's Composition and Rhetoric ; subject. Versification, pp. 218, 219. 



ENGLISH BEFORE CHAUCER. 31 

he alludes to events which occurred in 1297, he must have 
written, or at least finished, his Chronicle after that date. 

Character of the Work. — Eobert of Gloucester's Chronicle is a ver- 
sified history of British aflfairs, from the imaginary Brutus of Troy 
down to the death of Henry III., A. D. 1272. The first part is a 
translation from Geofirey of Monmouth. In later portions of his 
Chronicle he draws upon more trustworthy sources, and consequently 
his work has some value as history, particularly that describing the 
events and the social condition of England in the thirteenth century. 

Its Versification. — It is written for tlie most part in Alexandrine metre, or 
iambic twelve-syllable rhyming couplets. Sometimes the lines run into fourteen 
syllables. 

Its Diction. — The language shows great advance from the documents pre- 
viously described, and requires almost no change to be intelligible to the modern 
reader. The proportion of Romance, or Norman-French, words is about five per cent. 

The Chronicle was printed in 1724, and again reprinted in 1810. 

Robert of Brunne. 

At the distance of nearly half a century from Robert of 
Gloucester, is Robert Manning, generally called, from his 
birthplace, Robert of Brunne. His Chronicle was finished 
in the year 1338. 

Further Particulars. — Eobert of Brunne's Chronicle is the most 
voluminous work extant in the En^iish of this period. It gives a 
rhyming history of England from Brutus of Troy down to the death 
of Edward I., A. D. 1307. The first part, from Brutus to Cadwalader, 
A. D. 689, is a translation of Wace's Brutus, and is, like it, in eight- 
syllable rhyming couplets. The remaining portion is a translation 
from a contemporary Norman-French chronicle, and is, like it, in 
Alexandrian, or twelve - syllable rhyming couplets. It shows some 
advance, both in language and in poetical merit, upon its predecessors. 

The Metrical Romance. 

The essential feature of the Metrical Romance was a 
tale of love and adventure, told in verse. 

Origin of the Romance. — Metrical romances were first brought 
into England by the Normans. Works of this kind were immensely 
popular, both in France and England. At length, when the govern- 



32 ENGLISH LITERATUEE. 

ing race in England began to use the language of their adopted country, 
similar romances in English were composed for their amusement. 
These were imitations or translations from the Norman-French, and 
so little did the translators contribute to them of their own invention, 
that the names even of the authors have not come down to us. 

Period of the Metrical Romance — The Metrical Eomance began 
as early as A. D. 1200, about the time of Layamon's Brutus. It flour- 
ished to some extent during the thirteenth century, but the time of 
its greatest ascendency was in the fourteenth. After A. D. 1400, 
it began to wane, and finally it gave way to the prose romance, and 
then disappeared altogether for more than three hundred years, when 
it was for a time quickened into new life, though in a different form, 
by Sir Walter Scott. 

The Chronicle and the Romance Compared. — The names, countries, 
persons, events, and so on, which are found in the Chronicle, are found also in 
the Romance. But the latter, instead of containing merely a dry succession of 
events, breathes in each case the spirit of the age in which it was written, which 
was pre-eminently the age of adventure. The subjects indeed were various : some- 
times the siege of Troy ;. sometimes the deeds of Arthur and Merlin, long before the 
coming of the Romans ; sometimes the exploits of King Alexander, or of Charlemagne. 
But the time, the scene, the persons, made little difference in the character of the 
poem. Whatever was the name, date, or place of the events described, the real 
subjects were always a tale of love, an adventure for the true faith, a tournament, a 
troubadour, a Christian knight, a pagan foe. In form and in name, the romances were 
based upon the legendary chronicles of the monks and the rhymers, but in reality they 
were poetical portraitures of the state of society in which they were produced. 

Wliy Anonymous. — The interest of these works is in the storj% and that 
was of Norman-French origin. The English translators thought so little of their own 
labors as not even to affix their names to their works. Nor is the English dress which 
Vi'as given them of a character to entitle it to any sjDecial consideration. This general 
review, therefore, is all that seems to be required. 

Natnes of the Most Celehrated. — The names of some of the most cele- 
brated of these Romances are Sir Tristram, King Horn, Sir Havelok, Sir Guy, Tlie 
Squire of Low Degree, King Robert of Sicily, King Alisaiidir, The King of Tars, The 
Death of Arthur, Tlie Soudan of Damascus, etc. Most of them have been printed. 

EXTRACTS. 
King Arthur's Dream. The Same Modernized. 

To niht a mine slepe. To-night in my sleep, 

Ther ich laei on bure. Where I lay in bower. 

Me imaette a sweven ; Me befel a dream ; 

Ther vore ich ful sari aem. Therefor I full sorry am. 

Me imaette that mon me hof Me befel that men me hove [raised] 



ENGLISH BEFORE CHAUCER 



33 



Uppen are halle. 

Tha halle ich gon bestriden, 

Swulc ich wolde riden. 

Alle tha lond tha ich ah, 

Alle ich ther over sah. 

And Walwain sat bivoren me ; 

Mi sweord he bar an honde. 

Tha com Modred faren ther 

Mid mi-imete volke. 

He bar an his honde 

Ane wiax stronge. 

He bigon to hewene 

Hardliche swithe, 

And tha postes for-heou alle 

Tha heolden up the halle. 

Ther ich isey Wenheuer eke, 

Wimmonen leofuest me : 

Al there muche halle rof 

Mid hire honden heo to-droh. 

Tha halle gon to haelden, 

And ich haeld to gnmden, 

That mi riht aerm to-brac. 

Tha seide Modred, Have that ! 

Adun veol tha halle, 

And Walwain gon to valle, 

A feol a there eorthe ; 

His aermes brekeen beine. 

And ich igrap mi sweord leofe 

Mid mire leoft honde, 

And smaet of Modred is haft. 

That hit wond a there veld ; 

And tha quene ich al to-snathde, 

Mid deore mine sweorde, 

And seodthen ich heo adun sette 

In ane swarte putte. 

And al mi vole riche 

Sette to fleme, 

That nuste ich under Criste 



Upon airy hall. 

The hall I gan bestride, 

So as I would ride. 

All the land that I owed [owned], 

All I there oversaw. 

And Walwain ^ sat before me ; 

My sword he bore in hand. 

Then came Modred ^ to fare there 

With unmeasured folk. 

He bare in his hand 

An axe strong. 

He began to hew 

Hard-like very, 

And the posts through-hewed all 

That held up the hall. 

There I saw Guinever^ eke, 

Of women lovedest to me : 

All the much hall roof 

With her hands she down-drew. 

The hall began to tumble, 

And I tumbled to ground, 

That my right arm brake. 

Then said Modred, Have that ! 

Adown fell the hall, 

And Walwain gan to fall. 

And fell on the earth ; 

His arms broken both. 

And I griped my sword loved 

With my left hand. 

And smote off Modred his head, 

That it wended on the field ; 

And the queen I all snedded,* 

With my dear sword, 

And thereafter I her adown set 

In a black pit. 

And all my rich folk 

Set to flight. 

That ne-wist I under Christ 



*■ His armor-bearer. 2 His mortal foe. 

^ The Queen, who seemed in the dream to be in conspiracy with Modred against him. 

4 Cut to pieces. 

c 



34 



ENGLISH LITEEATURE, 



Whar heo bicomen weoren. 

Buten mi seolf ich gon atstonden 

Uppen ane wolden, 

And ich ther wondrien agon 

Wide yeond than moren, 

Ther ich isah gripes 

And greisliche fugheles. 

Tha com an gulden leo 

Lithen over dune. 

Deoren swithe hende 

Tha ure Drihten make. 

Tha leo me orn foren to, 

And iueng me bi than midle, 

And forth hire gun yeongen 

And to there sae wende. 

And ich isaeh thae vthen 

I there sae driuen ; 

And the leo i than ulode 

Iwende with me seolue. 

Tha wit i sae comen, 

Tha vthen me hire binomen. 

Com ther an fisc lithe, 

And fereden me to londe. 

Tha wes ich al wet. 

And weri of soryen, and seoc. 

Tha gon ich iwakien, 

Swithe ich gon to quakien ; 

Tha gon ich to binien 

Swule ich al fur burne. 

And swa ich habbe al niht 

Of mine sweuene swithe ithoht ; 

For ich what to iwisse 

Agan is al mi blisse ; 

For a to mine live 

Soryen ich mot driye. 

Wale that ich nabbe here 

Wenheuer mine queue ! 



Where they were become. 

But myself I gan stand 

Upon a wold [heath], 

And I there gan to wander 

Wide beyond [over] the moors. 

There I saw griffons 

And grisly fowls. 

Then came a golden lion 

To glide over the down. 

A deer [beast] very handsome 

That our Lord made. 

The lion me ran forward to, 

And took me by the middle, 

And forth herself gan move, 

And to the sea went. 

And I saw the waves 

In the sea drive ; 

And the lion in the flood 

Went with me self. 

When we in sea came. 

The waves from me her took. 

Came there a fish to glide. 

And brought me to land. 

Then was I all wet, 

A weary from sorrow, and sick. 

When gan I awaken. 

Much I gan to quaken ; 

Then gan I to tremble 

As if I all afire burned. 

And so I have all night 

Of my dream much thought ; 

For I wot to wis 

Agone is all my bliss ; 

For aye to my life 

Sorrow I must drive. 

Welaway that I ne-have here 

Guinever, my queen ! 



i 




CHAPTER 11. 

Chaucer and his Contemporaries. 

The fourteenth century is celebrated in English annals 
by the long and successful reign of Edward III., and by 
the military glories of his son, Edward the Black Prince, 
achieved in the famous battles of Crecy and Poitiers, in 
France. 

Civil and Religious Discontents. — Before the close of the century, 
also, serious discontents arose among the common people on account 
of the oppressions of the government, and the first distinct protest was 
uttered against the irregularities of the rehgious orders. In regard 
both to civil and religious liberty, there was a noteworthy struggle, 
and many of the reforms in both, which took effect two centuries 
later, are distinctly traceable to the efforts put forth, and the opinions 
expressed, in this stirring period. 

Writers of the Period. — The fourteenth century has a few names of 
note in the history of English literature. These are Chaucer, Gower, 
Piers Plowman, Wyckliffe, and Sir John Maot)eville. 

Chaucer. 
Geoffrey Chaucer, 1328-1400, is our first great poet, — so 
incomparably great, as to all that went before, that he is 
distinctively called the Father of Engli.sh Poetry. 

Without undertaking to determine the precise rank of 
Chaucer, it is yet safe to say that his name v.^ou]d be found 
in any list meant to include the five greatest poets of 
England. 

35 



36 ENGLISH LITERATUKE. 

Personal History. — The personal history of Chaucer is involved in 
no little obscurity. Neither the place nor the date of his birth is cer- 
tainly known, though an early tradition asserts that he was born in 
London, and the probabilities are in favor of the commonly received 
date of 1328, as that of his birth. His writings give abundant proof 
that he was liberally educated, and both the great Universities claim 
him. Even on this point, however, there is no certainty, though there 
is a fair probability in the conjecture that, according to a custom much 
prevalent at that time, he began his studies in one University and fin- 
ished them in the other, as there is also in the supposition that he 
spent some time in study abroad at the University of Paris. 

Social Position. — Chaucer evidently belonged to a good family, and 
his connections through life were with people of rank and quality. 
He lived in stirring times, being contemporary with Wyckliffe, John 
of Gaunt, the great Duke of Lancaster, Edward III., the invader of 
France, and his son the Black Prince, the hero of Crecy and Poitiers. 
Chaucer was himself m the army that invaded France, and was taken 
prisoner. He held at different times various offices of honor and 
emolument, and the few authentic records of him that we have show 
that he was on terms of intimacy with the highest nobility in the 
kingdom. 

Marriage. — Chaucer was by marriage closely connected with John 
of Gaunt, who was, for a long time, second only to the King himself, 
and whose son, Henry of Boiingbroke, during Chaucer's life, succeeded 
to the throne under the title of Henry lY. This marriage connection 
arose as follows : Xn the train of those who came over as attendants to 
Philippa of Hainault, Queen of Edward III., was Sir Pa}me Poet. 
Poet had two daughters, Katherine, who was married to the Duke of 
Lancaster, and Philippa, who was married to Chaucer. Philippa, 
Chaucer's wife, was maid of honor to the Queen, and Chaucer himself 
was valet to the King. 

FurtJier T'articulars. — By this marriage Chancer became allied also to eight 
kings, four queens, and five princes, of England; to six kings, and three queens, of 
Scotland ; to two cardinals, more than thirty dukes, and almost as many duchesses, of 
England ; to several dukes of Scotland; and to many princes and eminent nobility on 
the continent. Furthermore, his great-great grandson, John, Earl of Lincoln, a lineal 
descendant in the fifth generation, was declared heir to the throne of Richard III., 
but pei'ished, like his royal master, on the field of battle. 

Political and Religious Affinities. — Chaucer's writings show him to 
have been in sympathy with AYyckliffe and the Lancastrians, in their 
resistance to the encroachments of the Poman liierarchy. He does 
not indeed enter into the political and religious questions of the 



CHAUCER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 37 

time as a disputant, but the sketches of character whicli tie gives show 
plainly enough where his sympathies lie. Those who are painted as 
models of excellence, like the Good Parson, belong to the national 
party in the ecclesiastical hierarchy ; while those who are held up to 
ridicule, like the Friar and the Sumpnour, belong to the class whose 
ecclesiastical connection was with Rome rather than with England. 

Public Positions. — Chaucer was employed on several occasions in 
foreign embassies : some secret, the nature of which has not transpired, 
some for commercial negotiations, and some for negotiating royal and 
princely marriages. On one of these embassies into Italy, he is sup- 
posed to have met with the poet Petrarch. He held for many years 
the office of Comptroller of the Customs for the port of London, and he 
had various pensions from Edward III., from Richard IL, and from 
Henry IV. 

His Income. — Though at one time, for reasons which are not now 
known, he was straitened in his income, it is evident that during the 
greater part of his life his means were ample for the maintenance of 
that position in life which his connections entitled him to hold. His 
income, on a careful examination, is believed to have been about equal 
to that of the Chief Baron of the Exchequer of that day. 

Chaucer's principal work, The Canterbury Tales, is be- 
lieved to have been written late in life, after the age of 
sixty, though it is probable that one at least of the Tales, 
and that the longest in the collection, had been written 
earlier as a separate performance. 

Plan of the Work. — According to the plot of this celebrated work, 
the poet represents himself as bent on a pilgrimage to the tomb of 
Thomas k Becket, at Canterbury. At the Tabard Inn, in Southwark, 
he meets with nine-and-twenty other pilgrims, all bound on the same 
errand. They become acquainted, and resolve to make the journey in 
company, the host of the Tabard going along as self-constituted master 
of ceremonies. To beguile the tedium of the way, they agree that each 
shall tell a tale, both going and returning. Hence the name, " The 
Canterbury Tales." 

Structure of the Work. — In his Prologue, which is itself no incon- 
siderable poom, Chaucer describes each of his fellow travellers, and in 
these descriptions has given a series of portraits that are unequalled 
of their kind in English literature. In the art of word-painting, these 
portraits have never been surpassed. They constitute a picture gal- 



38 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

lery, of wliiclr the^reat English race may well be proud, as a monu- 
ment of art which can never decay, and which can never be stolen by 
Vandal invaders. The gay cavalcade having set out, the narration of 
the tales is interspersed with amusing incidents of the journey. Each 
tale is in keeping with the supposed character of the narrator ; and as 
each is taken from some walk in life different from the others, the 
whole together form a moving panorama of life and manners in the 
fourteenth century. Probably of no country in the world, except" per- 
haps Arabia and Palestine in the time of the Patriarchs, have we such 
a lively picture as Chaucer, in the Canterbury Tales, has given us of 
the England of Wyckliffe and Edward III. 

Circumstances of its Composition. — This work, so far as we can learn, was 
written during the last ten years of the author's life, and after his withdrawal from 
public business. The first threescore years of his life would seem to have been a sort 
of special training for this great work. He had been a student, a soldier, an oflBcer 
of the customs, a negotiator, a courtier. He had seen almost every phase of public 
life, had tried his hand at almost every kind of style "prosing and versing." He had 
successfully imitated the various modes of versification among continental writers, as 
well as those among his own countrymen, and had learned by experience which of 
them were best suited to- the genius of the English. He seems at this advanced age 
to have been not only in possession of the amplest fruits of experience, but with all 
his intellectual powers unabated. Thus endowed by nature, thus cultivated by art, 
thus laden with knowledge, thus invigorated by exercise, in circumstances of worldly 
comfort and honor, in the full enjoyment of royal favor, the veteran poet, from his 
"loopholes of retreat," may be seen casting his practiced -eye over society, and pen- 
ning those exquisite sketches of life and manners, which have made the Canterbury 
Tales the most amusing, as they are the most real and instructive, picture of the Eng- 
lish nation during the fourteenth century. 

Other Foems. — The other poems of Chaucer are, The Rnmaunt of the Rose; Tro- 
ilus and Oreseide; The Court of Love ; The Complaint of Pity ; Queen Annelida and False 
Arcite; The Assemhly of Foiols, sometimes called the Parliament of Birds; The Com- 
plaint of the Black Knight ; Cliaticer's A.B. C. ; The Book of the Diichess, WTitten on the 
occasion of the death of the first Duchess of Lancaster ; Tfte House of Fame; Chaucer's 
Dream; Tlie Flower and the Leaf; The Legend of Good Women ; The Complaint of JUars 
and Venus; Hie Cuckoo and the Nightingale. Besides these and some minor poems 
Chaucer wrote three prose works of considerable length : A translation of Boethius on 
Tlie Consolation of Philosophy; The Testament of Love; and Tlie Conclusio^is of the As- 
trolabe, a treatise on practical astronomy, as then known, written somewhat after the 
Peter Parley style, for the instruction and amusement of his young son Lewis. 

"In elocution and elegance, in harmony and perspicuity of versification, Chaucer 
surpasses his predecessors in infinite proportion: his genius Avas universal, and 
adapted to themes of unbounded variety ; and his merit was not less in painting fa- 
miliar manners with humor and propriety, than in moving the passions and. represent- 
ing the beautiful or pure in objects of nature, with grace and sublimity." — Warton. 

"I take unceasing delight in Chaucer. His merry cheerfulness is especially de- 
licious to me in my old age. How exquisitely tender he is, yet how perfectly free 
from the least touch of sickly melancholy, or morbid drooping." — Coleridge. 



CHAUCER AND HIS CONTEMPOE ARIES. 39 

Gower. 

John Gower, 1320 (?) - 1408, the contemporary and friend 
of Chaucer, was not equal to the latter in genius, or in the 
influence which he exerted on English literature, tie was 
far, however, from lacking either genius or influence, and 
his name is constantly coupled with tha.t of Chaucer in all 
the earlier authors or writers who have written of either. 

Gotoer and Chancer. — Not only are the two names conpled in this way, but in 
so quoting them, it is observable that the name of Gower uniformly precedes that of 
Chaucer, from which it has been inferred that Gower was the senior. 

" Gower, that first garnished our English rude ; 

And maister Chaucer, that nobly enterprised 
How that Engiishe myghte freshely be ennewed." — Skelton. 
" As moral Gower, whose sentencious dewe 
Adowne reflareth, with fayre golden beams ; 
And after, Chaucer'' s all abroad doth shewe." — Hawes. 
" Those of the first age were Gower and Chaucer.'''' — Sir Philip Sidney. 
The date of Gower's birth has not been ascertained, but it has been placed by con- 
jecture at J.320. 

Personal History. — Gower was the personal friend of Chaucer. 
This is evident from the manner in which the brother poets speak of 
each other. Thus Gower, in one of his poems, represents Venus as 

saying ; 

" And greet well Chaucer when ye meet, 
As my disciple and ray poete." 

And again Chaucer, in one of his early poems, makes the following 
dedication to Gower ; 

" moral Gower ! this boke I direct 
To thee, and to the philosophical Strode." 

His writings show him to have been a man of learning, and his will, 
lately brought to light, shows him to have had considerable possessions. 
He was married, but appears not to have had any children ; and a few 
years before his death he became blind. The bulk of his property was 
left to the rebuilding of a conventual church in Southwark, where his 
monument is still to be seen. 

Sank as a Poet. — The term " moral," applied by Chaucer, has stuck 
to Gower ever since, and is supposed to convey the idea that he was 
more concerned for the moral correctness of his writings than for their 
elegance or taste. Certain it is, that he lacks those qualities of imagi- 
nation, fancy, and humor, which mark so strongly his great contem- 
porary. Gower forms a sort of connecting link between the dying 



40 EXGLISH LITERATUEE. 

minstrelsy of tlie troubadours and the young and vigorous growth of 
an independent native literature. 

Besides some smaller poems, Gower wrote three large 
works, Speculum Meditantis (The Mirror of Meditation), 
in French ; Vox Clamantis (The Voice of One Crying in 
the Wilderness), in Latin ; and Confessio Amantis (The Con- 
fessions of a Lover), in English. 

History of these Works. — The Speculum Meditantis has not been seen in mod- 
ern times, and has probably perished. The Vox Clamantis remained in mannscript 
until 1S50, when it was printed for the Roxburghe Club. The Confessio Amantis has 

been frequently printed. 

Vox Clamantis. — This is in Latin Elegiacs, of vrhich there are seven 
books. The whole partakes very much of the character of an historical 
and moral essay. 

Confessio Amantis. — This, being in English, is the work by which 
Gower is chiefly known. It is of immoderate length, — extending to 
more than thirty thousand lines. It was once much read, though few 
would now undertake so formidable a task. 

Plan of the Poem. — The Confessio Amantis is in the form of a dialogue between 
a lover and his confessor, who is a priest of Venus. The lover, unable to gain the favor 
of his lady-love, seeks information and instruction on the subject from his priest. 
Thus the dialogue is supposed to begin. The argument is to this effect. * As every 
vice is in its nature unamiable, it ought to follow that immoi"ality is invariably pun- 
ished by the indignation of the fair sex ; and that every fortunate lover is of necessity 
a good man and a good Christian. On this presumption, the confessor passes in re- 
view all the defects of human character, and carefully scrutinizes the heart of his 
penitent with respect to each. And whereas example is more impressive than precept, 
he illustrates his injunctions by a series of apposite tales, with the morality of which 
the lover professes to be highly edified. Being more addicted to learning than lovers 
generally are, he gives his instructor an opportunity of initiating him into all the 
mysteries of the Aristotelian philosophy and of alchemy. Thus the author goes on 
through the whole encyclopaedia of ancient erudition, drawing not from nature 
and the workings of his owti mind, which is the only sure way of interesting the 
minds of others, but from his commonplace work, and making an immense patch- 
work of most grave and learned morality, having in it nothing that comes home to 
men's " business and bosoms." and about as interesting, for a work of the imagination, 
as a table of contents, or a chronological chart ! He appears to have aimed, not so 
much to please the imagination of his readers, as to astonish them by the array of his 
learning. He has therefore laid under contribution all the learning of the age, such 
as it was, and to have cast it into the mould required by the frigid conceits of the 
Courts of Love of the Provencal and the early English romances. 

* See Ellis's Early English Poets. 



CHAUCER AND HIS COXTEMPOR ARIES . 41 

Piers Plowman. 

Another work of great celebrity and value, belonging to 
this period of our literary history, is one commonly known 
as Piers Plowman. It was completed about the same time 
as The Canterbury Tales, but is in many respects in striking 
contrast with that great work. 

Piers Plowman is an allegorical and satirical poem, in the 
form of a series of visions, or dissolving views, in which 
the various characters and occupations of men pass under, 
review. 

The Name. — So litde is known of the author of this work that in 
referring to it, or quoting from it, writers more frequently speak of 
Piers Plowman, which is the name commonly given to the poem, than 
of Langland, which was probably the name of the author. The full 
and proper title of this work is. The Vision of William concerning 
Piers the Plowman. 

The Author. — The true name of the poet, the dreamer who had 
this vision concerning the Plowman, is not certainly known. The 
poem has, however, been very generally ascribed to one Langland, 
whose Christian name has been variously given as William, Robert, 
and John. Yet of the Christian name we are sure. It is written Wil- 
liam invariably in the MS. copies, and the author in various passages 
calls himself WiUe. 

History of the Author. — Yfilliam Langland, so far as can be ascer- 
tained, appears to have been born about 1332, and to have died about 
the year 1400. He was bom in moderate circumstances, but was sent 
to school, and acquired some knowledge of books. He was not, how- 
ever, an accomplished scholar, like Chaucer and WycklifFe, nor did he 
move like them in the higher circles of social life. He saw life rather 
among the poor and lowly, and is to be accepted as the true interpreter 
of their thoughts and feelings. 

History of the 'Poem. — The work in its fir.5t form appeared in 1362, when the 
author was about thirty years old. It was, however, at that time, only a rou.sh 
sketch, containing not more than 2,567 lines. Fifteen years later, in lo77. ron.sed by 
the troubles wliich ensued upon the death of the Hlack Prince, the autlior revit^od and 
greatly enlarged his work. Later still, probably about 1380, he gave still another re- 
vision, extending it to about 15,000 lines. Manuscript copies exist in all these vary- 
ing forms, and hence some confusion in the accounts given of the work, some explorers 
having examined it in one form, and some in another. 
4* 



42 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

Hie Contents. — Though the whole work is called after the " Plowman," who fig- 
ures in it more largely than any one else, there are really two poems, the latter con- 
taining a series of Visions about Dowel, Dobet, and Dobest (Do-Well, Do-Better, Do- 
Best). It is divided into twenty sections, or Passus, each Passus forming a distinct 
vision. 

Form, of the Poem. — The old Saxon poetry had a form peculiar to itself. It 
■was neither metrical, like the classic poetry, nor rhyming, like the modern, but was 
distinguished by a peculiar consonantal alliteration. The lines had no fixed length, 
but had usually about fourteen syllables, and were divided into two distinct parts about 
the end of the eighth ; and the words were so selected and arranged that at least two 
leading words in the first section, and at least one word in the second section, began 
with the same letter. Thus : 

Ac now is religion a rider, || a roamer about, 
A teader of Zove-days, || and a Zond-buyer. 

Sometimes printed thus : 

Ac now is religion a rider, 

A roamer about, 

A Zeader of Zove-days, 

And a Zond-buyer. 

But in the old manuscript copies, it is always found written in the long lines, with a 
mark of some kind to show the division into sections. 

The author of the Vision concerning Piers Plowman, either from an admiration of 
this form of verse, or from a strong national feeling, and a belief that a poem, in the 
form known and dear to their ancestors in the bright days of Alfred the Great, might 
have greater power to stir the national heart, made a resolute effort to revive this old 
Saxon alliteration. So popular was his work in its other features, that lie was well- 
nigh successful in this, and the question as to what should in future generations be 
the tj'pe of English verse seemed for a time to hang in the balance. But in truth the 
English people had at that time pretty much forgotten the Anglo-Saxon verse. The 
national ear, from the first beginnings of the new life, after the blending of Saxons 
and Normans, had been trained to the rhyming verse introduced by the Norman 
troubadours More than all, while the Vision was in the height of its p(jpularity, and 
the question between the old and the new seemed still hanging in the balance, the 
sweet rhymes and cadences of Chaucer turned the scale decisively, and the decision 
has never been reversed. 

Hie Prologue. — In the Prologue, the author describes how, weary of wandering, 
he sits down to rest upon the Malvern Hills, and then falls asleep and dreams. In 
his vision, the world and its people are represented to him by a field full of folk, busily 
engaged in their avocations. There were ploughmen and spendthrifts, anchorites, 
merchants, jesters, beggars, pilgrims, hermits, and friars. There also wei-e lawyers, 
burgesses, tradesmen, laborers, and taverners, touting for custom. In the description 
of all these is much biting satire. 

" Chaucer describes the rich more fully than the poor, and shows us the holiday- 
making, cheerful, genial phase of English life ; but Langland pictures the homely 
poor in their ill-fed, hardworking condition, battling against hunger, famine, injus- 
tice, oppression, and all the stern realities and hardships that tried them as gold is 
tried in the fire. Chaucer's satire often raises a good-humored laugh ; but Langland's 
is that of a man who is constrained to speak out all the bitter truth, and it is as ear- 
nest as is the cry of an injured man who appeals to Heaven for vengeance." — Skeat. 



CHAUCEK AXD HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 43 

Piers Plowman's Creed. — About the year 1394, a poem 
called Piers Plowman's Creed appeared. It is alliterative, 
4ike the preceding, and has often been attributed incor- 
rectly to the same author. Its real authorship is unknown. 

Oi'iff in. — The author evidently aimed to take advantage of the popularity of the 
other work, and chose his title accordingly. The poem, however, is very diiTerent in 
spirit and tone from the original, being marked throughout with harshness and 
asperity. 

Wyekliffe. 

John Wyckliffe, 1324-1384, known among Protestants 
as " The _MoTning Star of the Reformation," may almost be 
styled also the Fatjier of English Prose, as his contempo- 
rary, Chaucer, is the Father of English Poetry. WycklifFe 
was at least one of the earliest writers who in plain and 
vigorous prose addressed the common people in words fa- 
miliar to the hearths and homes of England. 

WycklifFe wrote many treatises : some learned, addressed 
to scholars and the higher orders, and some in homely 
phrase, addressed to the common people. But his chief 
literary work was A Translation of the Holy Bible. 

The First English Version. — Separate portions of the Holy Scrip- 
tures had been translated into English before this time. But Wvck- 
liffe's was the first translation of the whole Bible into English. It was 
completed in 1382, and revised in 1388. 

Coadjutors. — In making this version, Wyckliffe had several coadjutors, — men 
■who were disciples of his, and sympathized in his views. The New Testament was 
translated chiefly by Wyclcliffe himself, and the Old Testament by Nicholas de Here- 
ford. After the death of Wyckliffe, the whole work was revised by another disciple, 
Richard Purvey. Wyckliffe was the animating and directing soul of the movement, 
and himself executed no small part of the work, and the whole is popularly known 
as Wyckliffe's Version. The more exact term, however, is The Wyckliffite Version-^, 
meaning by that phrase the earlier Version of 1382, which was mainly the work of 
Wyckliffe and Hereford, and the Revision of 1388, which was the work of Purvey. 

Character of the Version. — Wyckliffe's translation was made directly from the 
Latin Vulgate, not from the original Hebrew and Greek. It is extremely literal, and 
is marked by great homeliness of style, studiously avoiding the language of scholars 
and of courtly people. In the Revision by Purvey, the extreme literalness of the first 
issue is to some extent avoided, and more freedom of translation is used. 

Influence. — Wyckliffe's Version was much used in his own day. and for soire 
generations following, and it had great influence both upon English speech and reli- 



44 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

gious opinions. Moreover, the movement which it inaugurated led finally, in a later 
day, to the formation of the Version now in common use ; and, though not directly 
and avowedly, yet really, it contributed a good deal to the language of our present 
version. Beft.re the time of Henry VIII. and of James I., when our present Version 
■was made, the English of Wyckliffe had indeed become, to a considerable extent, 
obsolete. Yet many of its homely and expressive phrases found their way into the 
new version, and are a part of our present literary inheritance. 

Whetx I*rinted. — As Wyckliffe's Version was made before the invention of 
printing, its original circulation was of course in manuscript. The New Testament 
was first printed in 17ol. The whole Bible was not printed until 1850, when a sump- 
tuous edition, in 4 vols., 4to, was issued by the Oxford Univeisity press. This work 
contains the Original text of 1382, and Purvey's Eevision of 13S8, in parallel columns ; 
and it is edited with critical accuracy by the Rev. Josiah Forshall and Sir Frederick 
Madden. 

WycTilijfe at Oxford, — Wyckliffe was educated at Oxford, and in 1361 he was 
Master of Ballol Hall in that University. He was skilled beyond most of his English 
contemporar.es in scholastic divinity, and in his knowledge of the subtleties of logic. 
He is said to have known the more difficult parts of Aristotle by heart. He was also 
conversant with the civil and canon law, and was profoundly read in the Latin 
Fathers. Such learning, combined with great vigor and acutoness of understanding, 
HTid a sturdy Saxon independence of character, would have made him distinguished 
in any age. He received various appointments at the University, and at the age of 
forty-eight read lectures on divinity there with great applause. 

WycMiffe as a Meformer. — Wyckliffe's attention was first called to the irregu- 
larities of the religious orders by the bickerings and intrigues of those connected 
■with the University. Having taken an active part in resisting the encroachments of 
the friars resident at Oxford, he was afterwards led to extend his inquiries into the 
state of the Church generally, until by degrees he reached and boldly published con- 
clusions not much behind those proclaimed by Luther at a later day. Wyckliffe not 
only advanced these oinnions freely in bis sermons and lectures, and in public trea- 
tises, but he had a large number of followers — pupils who imbibed from him their 
views of theology and ecclesiastical polity, and then diffused them throughout the 
kingdom, wherever they themselves were scattered. One of his pupils carried these 
opinions into Bohemia, on the continent, where they resulted in awaking the zeal of 
IIuss and of Jerome of Prague. Wyckliffe is regarded by historians as the earliest 
instance of an open and direct attack by a learned clergyman upon the authority of 
the Church and of the supreme Pontiff. Earnest discussions ensued, and grave eccle- 
siastical censures, foreshadowing penalties of a still m ore serious character. But Wyck- 
liffe was sustained by some of the powerful nobles of England, and especially by John 
of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. He continued, therefore, to propagate his opinions, 
preaching, lecturing, and writing, till the day of his death. He died of a palsy, while 
celebrating mass, on the 30th of December, 1384, aged sixty years. 

" Wyckliffe was a subtile schoolman and a popular religious pamphleteer. He ad- 
dressed the students of the University in the InnguMge and in the logic of their schools; 
he addressed t!.e vulgar — which included, no doubt, the whole laity and avast number 
of the parochial clergy — in the simplest and most homely vernacular phrases. Hence 
he is, as it were, two writers: his Latin is dry. argumentative, syllogistic, abstruse, 
obscure; his English rude, coarse, but clear, emphatic, brief, vehement, with short, 
stinging sentences, and perpetual hard antithesis." — fl^e»?-y HaH Milman. 



CHAUCER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES 



45 



Mandeville. 

Sir John Mandeville, 1300-1372, is the earliest notable 
instance of the genuine English Traveller, "The Bruce of 
the fourteenth century." 

His Travels. — Mandeville left home at the age of twenty-seven, and 
travelled for thirty-four years, going first to Jerusalem, and then on 
eastward into the remotest parts of Asia. On returning, he wrote a 
book describing some of the marvellous things that he had seen. 

Bis HooTi. — This book of Voyage and Travel was written by him at first in Latin, 
then in French, then in English. It was translated into Italian, Spanish. Dutch, and 
German. Books of travel were not so common then as they are now, and this work of 
Mandeville's, giving an account by an eye-witness of remote regions and nations, the 
very existence of which was almost unknown among the people of Europe, was read 
with the greatest avidity. With the credulity of the age, he embodied in his work 
every grandam tale that came in his way ; yet, on the whole, he is wortliy of credit 
when describing what came under his own observation. It is not uncommon to find 
him in one page giving a sensible account of .something which he saw, and in the 
next repeating with equal seriousness the story of Gog and Magog, and of men with 
tails, or the account of the Madagascar bird which could carry elephants through the 
air. The work is interesting as one of the earliest specimens of English prose. 



EXT 
From Piers Plowman. 
In a somer seson. 

Whan soft was the sonne, 
I shope me in shroudes. 

As I a shepe were, 
In habite as an heremite, 

Unholy of works. 
Went wyde in this world 

Wondres to here. 
Ac on a May mornynge, 

On Malverne huUes, 
Me befel a ferly. 

Of fairy, me thoughte ; 
I was wery forwandred, 

And went me to reste 
Under a brode banke, 

By a bornes side, 
And as I lay and lened. 

And loked in the wateres, 
I slorabred in a slepyng, 

It swevved so merve. 



R A C T S. 

The Same Modernized. 
In a summer season, 

When soft was the sun, 
I shaped me into shrouds, 

As I a shepherd were, 
In habit as a hermit. 

Unholy of works. 
Went wide in this world 

Wonders to hear. 
And on a IMay morning, 

On Malvern hills. 
Me befel a ferly [wonder], 

Of fairy, methought; 
I was weary forwandered, 

And went me to rest 
Under a broad bank, 

By a burn's side, 
And as I lay and leaned. 

And looked in the watens, 
I slumbered in a sleeping, 
It swaved so merrv. 



46 ENGLISH LITERATUKE 



Good Counsel of Chaucer. 

This little poem is said to have been made by Chaucer " upon his death-bed, lying 
in his anguish." In pi-inting it, a diaeresis is used to show that a vowel which has 
become silent, was once sounded, and must now be sounded, in order to make out the 
rhythm ; as, sufSce, pronounced suf-fi-ce. The accent is used for a like purpose, to 
show when the accent has been changed ; as, env/, savour, pronounced with the accent 
on the last sylluble. 

Flee from the press, and dwell with soothfastness ; 

Suffice thee^ thy good, though it be small ; 
For hoard'^ hath hate^ and climbing tickleness. 

Press hath envy,^ and weal is blent* over all. 

Savour^ no more than thee behove shall ; 
Rede^ well thyself, that other folk canst rede, 
And truth thee shall deliver, it is no drede. 

Paine thee not each crooked to redress,'' 

In trust of her that turneth as a ball,^ 
Greate rest stant in little business ; ^ 

Beware also to spurn again a nall,^° 

Strive not as doth a crocke with a wall ; 
Deeme'^ thyself, that deemest others' deed, 
And truth thee shall deliver, it is no drede. 

That thee is sent receive in buxomness,^^ 
The wrestling of this world asketh a fall ; ^^ 

Here is no home, here is but wilderness. 

Forth, pilgrim ! forth, beast, out of thy stall 1 
Look up on high, and thanke God of all ; 

Weive^* thy lust, and let thy ghost^^ thee lead, 

And truth thee shall deliver, it is no drede. 

1. Be satisfied with the good thou hath. 2. "Wealth brings hate. 3. A crowd of 
followers makes you envied. 4. "Blent," blinded; wealth or prosperity, more than 
all else, makes one blinded. 5. " Savour," taste ; be not greedy to taste more pleasure 
than shall properly belong to thee. 6. " Rede," counsel. 7. Do not fret yourself by 
undertaking to reform all that goes wrong. 8. The goddess Fortune. 9. The way to 
secure rest is to have not too much to do. 10. "Nail," nail; take care not to kick 
against a nail. 11. " Deeme," judge. 12. Receive civilly whatever lot is sent you. 
13. Life being a wrestling-match, you must expect a fall now and then. 14. " Weive," 
restrain. 15. " Ghost," spirit ; let thy spirit, not thy inclination lead thee. 



t^ 




„'^ 



l^ 




CHAPTER III. 

Early Scotch Poets. 

From the time of Chaucer, for a period of nearly two cen- 
turies, the succession of minstrels and poets seems to have 
been limited to the northern part of the island, nearly all 
the poetical writers of any note in this period being Scotch- 
men. 

Tliese early Scotch poets are Barbour, Wyntoun, 
James I. of Scotland, Blind Harry, Henryson, Dunbar, 
Gawin Douglas, and Lindsay. 



BarboLir. 

John Barbour, 1320 (?)-1396, Archdeacon of Aberdeen, 
and a contemporary of Chaucer's, was a poet of considerable 
note. 

m 
Note. — Barbour seems not to have been acquainted with the writings of Chaucer, 
though contemporary with him. His writings accordiuglj", and most of those who 
liave been gi'ouped with him, are of quite a different type from any of those mentioned 
in the previous chapter, and belong to a different school of poetry, tliough running 
partly through the same period. 

Barbour wrote two extended poems, The Brute, sl metrical 
chronicle, tracing the Scottish kings back to Brutus of 
Troy, and The Bruce, recounting the warlike deeds of the 
Scottish hero, Robert Bruce. 

Note. — The Bnite was in existence in the next centurv, being often 
quoted, but has since been lost. The Bruce still exists, and has 

47 



48 ENGLISH LITERATUEE. 

several times been printed. The best edition is that by Dr. Jamieson, 
in 4to, 1820. 

CJiaracter of the Poem. — Barbour calls The Bruce a Romaunt, By this we 
are not to understand that the work is a fiction, but that the deeds of the hero are in 
themselves romantic. Barbour's work, though in verse, is an important historical 
document, being a metrical chronicle of the great Scottish hero, written soon after 
his death, and while the facts were still fi-esh in the minds of all. It is indeed a 
complete history of the memorable transactions by which Robert I. asserted the inde- 
pendence of Scotland ; at the same time, it has no little of poetic fire and of rhythmi- 
cal harmony. The poem consists of more than 12,500 lines, of which more than 2,000 
are occupied with the battle of Baunockburn. 

JifinJc as a Poet, — Barbour's poetry carries us back to the age of the metrical 
romances. In its form, it is very much like that of Robert of Brunne, who wrote only 
half a century previous. It is in the same kind of verse, the eight-syllable iambic, 
rhyming in couplets. In fire and spirit, however, it is far superior to anything in 
the old romances and troubadours. Barbour is far from being equal to Chaucer. He 
has not the abounding humor, the fine sense of the beautiful, the wonderfully deli- 
cate appreciation of character, which mark the writings of the latter. He is, how- 
ever, unquestionably superior to Gower. His diction is clear, strong, and direct, and 
sometimes highly animated and picturesque; he is everywhere warmed, and .he warms 
his readers, with a feeling of generous patriotism ; withal, he has for his subject, not 
a mere metaphysical abstraction, some frigid and chilling conceit about the rhapso- 
dies and the pangs of Platonic love, but the wrongs of his brother Scots, oppressed by 
a foreign yoke, the exploits of the hero who, next to Wallace, has always been the 
idol of Scotchmen — the glorious field of Bannockburn ! No wonder that, while the 
Confessio Amantis was quietly consigned to the archives of the curious. The Bruce 
was enshrined in the heart of the million, and continued for several centuries to be 
the national epic of Scotland. 

Wyntoun. 

Andrew Wyntoun, 1350 (?)-1430 (?), Prior of St. Serf's, 
Lochleven, -^vrote a Chronicle of Scotland. 

Character of the Chronicle. — Wyntoun's Chronicle, more ambitious than 
those founded upon the Brutus of Troy, gives the story of the Scotch kings, in regular 
descent, from the birth of Cain. It is in the eight- syllable rhyming couplets. 
Though far inferior to the Bruce of Barbour, it is not without its value, both as a 
specimen of the language, and as a representative of ancient manners and ideas. The 
later portions of the Chronicle also are of considerable value as an historical record. 
The exact title is An Originale Kronylcil of Scotland. 

James I. of Scotland. 

James L of Scotland, 1395-1437, was a poet of no little 
worth and consideration, and was the first of the Scot- 
tish poets whose writings show signs of the influence of 
Chaucer. 



EARLY SCOTCH POETS. 49 

James was the author of The Ki7ig^s Qahair [Quire or 
Book], and perhaps also of some other poems, the authorship 
of which is disputed. 

History of James. — James, while yet a lioy of ten, was taken captive by the 
English monarch, and kept for nineteen years in captivity in England. He was there 
instructed in all the polite learning and accomplishments of the age, and appears to 
have been particularly conversant with the writings of Chaucer. While living in 
Winds( ■: Castle, a prisoner of state, he met with a characteristic incident, which is 
the subject of his chief poem already named. The royal prisoner, now in the prime 
of manhood, glowing with honorable sentiments, and excluded from the means of 
giving them expression, sees from his palace-prison a fair and noble lady walking in 
the adjacent garden. He becomes enamored of the lady, and writes the poem in her 
honor. 

Tlie Poem. — The King's Quhair is a serious poem, of the allegorical kind, cele- 
brating the love of the royal poet for the Lady Joanna Beaufort, who afterwai'ds be- 
came his wife. It is in the Rhythm-Royal,* or seven-line stanza, introduced by Chau- 
cer, and contains one hundred and ninety-seven stanzas ; and it displays a degree of 
grace, beauty, and sweetness that makes us regret that the author was doomed to 
the doubtful honors of royalty 

James's End. — This graceful and polished monarch was suited to a more ad- 
vanced stage of civilization than that which prevailed in Scotland in the fifteenth 
century. Though not lacking in strength or courage, he was unequal to the task of 
curbing those fierce Scottish nobles, by a party of whom he was finally assassinated 
in 1437, at the age of forty-two. When the assassins were trying to break into his 
apartments, a staple or bar being wanted to fasten the door, Catherine Douglas, a lady 
attendant upon the queen, thrust her arm into the bolt-hole, and so kept it, until the 
limb was entirely crushed by the bloody miscreants. The queen herself rushed be- 
tween them and the object of their vengeance, vainly endeavoring to receive upon 
her own person the multiplied wounds that were inflicted upon his. Such was the 
end of the ill-fated James. He was a true poet and a true man. He deserved well of 
woman's love, and he was rewarded with a true and heroic constancy. 

Blind Harry. 

Henry the Minstrel, or Blind Harry, a wandering Scotch 
minstrel, was the author of a poem called Sir William 
WallacBy in twelve books, supposed to have been written 
about the year 1470. 

Note. — A paraphrase of the poem, in modern Scotch, by William 
Hamilton, has long been a popular work in Scotland. 

Chayacter. — As a poet, Blind Harry cannot be rated very high, and his Wallace 
was supposed at one time to be untriistworthy ; but recent investigations have shown 
that its author must have been in possession of valuable authentic materials. Many 
incidents unknown to other Scottish authors are corroborated by English annalists 
and by records published oniy recently. 

*See Hart's Rhetoric, p. 229, 
5 P 



50 ENGLISH LITEEATURE. 

Form and Size. — Blind Harry's Wallace is in ten-syllable rhyming couplets, 
and contains about twelve thousand lines. 

Henryson. 

Robert Henryson was an early Scottish poet of some 
celebrity, of whose personal history little is known except 
that he was schoolmaster at Danfermline, and that he died 
before 1508. 

Henry son's WorJcs, — Henryson wrote The Testament of Fair Cresdde, as a sequel 
to Chaucer's TroiJus and Creseide; and a translation of JEsop's Fables. One of these 
fables, The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse, is often referred to for its humor and 
spirit. Henryson wrote also a pastoral, Robin and Makyne. 

Dunbar. 

William Dunbar, 1465-1530, is the most illustrious of 
Scotch poets, except Scott and Burns. Prof Craik calls 
Dunbar " The Chaucer of Scotland," and Sir Walter Scott 
pronounces him to be, without exception, " a poet unrivalled 
by any that Scotland has ever produced." 

Note. — Dunbar's works, with a small exception, remained in 
manuscript, unknown to the world for more than two centuries, and it 
is only within the memory of persons still living that full justice has 
been done to his merits. His poems began to attract attention about 
the middle of the last century, and since that time his fame has been 
steadily rising ; and it became at length so great that in 1834 a com- 
plete edition of his works was printed. 

Dunbar's Histori/. — 'Dunhiir was educated at the University of St. Andrew's, 
and became a friar of the Franciscan Order. In this capacity he spent several years 
as a travelling preacher, living on the alms of the pious, through Scotland, England, 
and France. He was also employed on various occasions in conducting negotiations 
for King James IV. with foreign courts, and in this capacity he visited Germany, 
Spain, and Italy, as well as France and England. By these means he acquired a 
knowledge of men and of affairs which aided him in the composition of his works. 
He lived at court the latter part of liis life, a dependent upon the royal bounty, and 
was not a little saddened and humiliated by the feeling of his dependence. 

His WorJes. — Dunbar was master of almost every kind of verse. His poems are 
divided into three classes: The Allegorical, the Moral, and the Comic. His chief alle- 
gorical poems are The Thidlp. and tite. Rose, a nuptial song, celebrating the union of 
King James and the Princess Margaret of England ; The Dance of the Seven Deadly 
Sins through Hell; The Golden Terge^ a profane parody on some of the ancient litanies. 
One of the best specimens of his Moral i)ieces is Tiie Merle and the Nightingale, in which 
these two rival songsters debate ip alternate sta,nzas the merits of Earthly and Heav- 



EARLY SCOTCH POETS. 51 

enly Love. Of the Comic pieces, the most famous are Twa Harried Women and the 
Widow, iu which three gay ladies discuss in no very delicate terms the merits of their 
husbands; The Friars of Berwick, a, licentious tale, full of the broadest farce; Tlie 
Solder and the Tailor, an imaginary tournament between a shoemaker and a tailor, in 
the same region where the Seven Deadly Sins held their dance. 

" Burns is certainly the only name among the Scottish poets that can be placed in 
the same line with that of Dunbar; and even the inspired ploughman, though the 
equal of Dunbar in comic power and his superior in depth of passion, is not to be 
compared with the elder poet either in strength, or in general fertility of imagina- 
tion." — Craik. 

Gawin Douglas. 

Gawin Douglas, 1475-1522, Bishop of Dunkeld, has the 
special honor of being the first to translate into English 
verse any ancient classic, Greek or Latin. 

Douglas translated Virgil's ^neid in an elegant and 
scholarly manner, and wrote several original poems posses- 
sing considerable merit. 

Sistory. — Gawin Douglas was son of Archibald, fifth Earl of Angus, surnamed 
Bell-the-Cat. Unlike most of the members of that fierce and haughty family, Gawin 
was trained to letters instead of arms. He studied at the University of Paris, entered 
the Church, and rose to the bishopric. He was noted in that rude age for his refine- 
ment and scholarly tastes, and for " his moderation and peacefulness." He wrote Tlie 
Palace of Honor, an allegory reminding one of Pilgrim's Progress, and another poem, 
King Hart, giving an allegorical view of human life. But the work by which he is 
best known is his Translation of Virgil's ^neid, already mentioned. 

Sir Walter Scott, in one of the most striking scenes in Marmion, has 
drawn a beautiful picture of Gawin Douglas. It is the celebrated mid- 
night scene in the chapel of Tantallon tower : 
"A Bishop by the altar stood, 

A noble lord of Douglas blood, 

"With mitre sheen, and rocquet white. 

Yet showed his meek and thoughtful eye 

But little pride of prelacy ; 

More pleased that, in a barbarous age. 

He gave rude Scotland Virgil's page, 

Than that beneath his rule he held 

The bishopric of fair Dunkeld. 

Beside him ancient Angus stood, 

Doffed his furred gown, and sable hood ; 

O'er his huge form, and visage pale, 

He wore a cap and shirt of mail ; 



52 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

And leaned his large and wrinkled hand 
Upon the huge and sweeping brand 
Which wont of yore, in battle fray 
His foeman's limbs to shred away, 
As wood-knife lops the sapling spray. 
He seemed as, from the tombs around, 

Eising at judgment-day, 
Some giant Douglas may be found 

In all his old array ; 
So pale his face, so huge his limb, 
So old his arms, his look so grim." 

Lindsay. 

Sir David Lindsay, 1490-1555, a satiric poet, and a fit 
successor to Dunbar and Gawin Douglas, closes the line 
of early Scotch poets. 

Histort/ . ^'LmAsn,y''s personal history, as well as his poetry, is intimately mingled 
with the aifairs of the Scottish Court, and particularly with those of his sovereign, 
James V. While James was a boy, Lindsay was his attendant, carver, cup-bearer, 
purse-master, chief-cubicular, in short his man Friday, bearing the little fellow on his 
back, dancing antics for his amusement. James, on coming to the throne, did not 
forget the poet, but gave him the valuable office of King-at-arms. 

His Poetry. — Lindsay's poems are entirely satirical, and have many 
of the characteristics of Dunbar's satires. They are vituperative and 
wanting in refinement, yet bold, vigorous, and biting. The chief ob- 
jects of his satire were the clergy, whom he lashed without mercy. 
One of his pieces, The Play of the Three Estates, is a pungent satire upon 
the three great political orders — monarch, barons, and clergy. Strange 
to say, it was acted before the Court. 

Other Poems. — His other poems are The Dream, The Complaint of the King^s 
Pajjingo, Kittie's Confession, The History of Squire Meldrum, and Tlie Monarchy. 



im^ 




CHAPTER IV. 

From Chaucer to Spenser. 

The authors brought together in the present Chapter are 
in the main connected with the long and memorable reign of 
Henry VIII., 1509-1547, or the first half of the sixteenth 
century. 

This period is known in history as the age of the Reformation. The 
great names most conspicuously associated with it are Henry VIII., 
Francis I., Charles V., Leo X., Michael Angelo, Raphael, Luther, 
Calvin, Erasmus, Wolsey, More, and Cranmer. 

Note. — Some of the authors named in this Cliapter run back into the reign of 
Henry VII., and some go forward into the reign of Edward VI., 1547-1553, and of 
Mary, 1553-1558, and even into that of Elizabeth. Such a lapping over from one 
reign to another is a necessary incident, history being not a succession of pools, but 
a continuous stream. It will be found on examination, liowever, that those writers 
here named, whose works run back or forward into the contiguous reigns, yet belong 
in the main to the reign of Henry VIII. 

The Art of Printing. — The invention of the art of printing, about 
the middle of the fifteenth century, gave a new impulse to authorship, 
as to every other art and enterprise. 

Effect of JPrinting on Authorship. — Tlie writings of Chaucer, Wyckliffe, 
and other early authors, were in a certain sense published among their contempora- 
ries. That is, copies of these works were made and circulated in manuscript by 
friends and admirers, and were read to select circles in the halls of the nobility and 
the gentry, at stalls in churches and monasteries, at fairs and other public places, or 
by stealth at the private meetings of guilds and sectaries. To such an extent a book 
was published. But publication, in the sense of the word now understood, was first 
made i)0ssible by the invention of the art of printing, and it has added enorniouslj' to 
the growth of authorship. So great has been the effect of this and of other causes 



54 ENGLISH LITEKATURE. 

upon the matter of authorship, that more works are now produced in English in a 
single year than all that existed in the language from the earliest times down to the 
time of the invention of the art of printing. The few authors and works enumerated 
in the preceding chapters include all of any value down to the time of Caxton, the 
first English printer. From his time, books grew apace. 

Caxton. 

William Caxton, 1412-1492, the first English printer, like all the 
early printers, was himself a man of learning, and wrote many of the 
works which he printed. Most of them were translations. 

Ilistory. — Caxton was a merchant of Ijondon, and was employed hy Edward IV. 
to negotiate a treaty with the Duke of Burgundy. While at the court of the Duke, 
he translated into English and printed The History of Troy. This was the first book 
printed in the English language. It was printed on the continent, about the year 
1474. Caxton soon after returned to England, and set up his printing-press in West- 
minster. He printed sixty-four different books, a good many of which he wrote or 
translated himself. The first book printed in England was The Game and Play of 



Sir Thomas More. 

Sir Thomas More, 1480-1535, was, next to Erasmus and 
Cardinal Wolsey, the most conspicuous and shining charac- 
ter in the reign of Henry VIII. He was a man of wonder- 
ful versatility as well as force of genius, being equally dis- 
tinguished as a statesman, a man of lively wit, a scholar, and 
a devout Christian. 

Works. — More wrote many works, mostly of a controversial kind. 
The only work by which he is now known is The Utopia. 

His Education. — More was born in London, the only son of Sir John More, a 
Judge of the Court of King's Bench. After a carelul course of instruction by a private 
tutor, he was transferred at the age of fifteen to the family of Cardinal Morton, Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury, that he might mingle with the celebrated and learned men who 
freciuented the house of that dignitary. At the age of seventeen he went to Oxford, 
where he made the acquaintance of Erasmus, then resident at the University. 

Mis Mise to Potver. — On leaving the University, More studied law, and began 
to practise. lie rose rapidly in his profession, and was soon retained on one side or 
the other of almost every important case. He was elected a member of Parliament 
at an early age ; according to some accounts when only twenty-one. On the ac- 
cession of Henry VIII,, in 1509, More was employed in some negotiations with the 
Archduke Charles (afterwards the Emperor Charles V.), and displayed such ability 
that the young King and his prime minister Wolsey seemed desirous of occupying his 
wliole time with public affairs. More accordingly retired gradually from the pursuit 
of liis profession, and gave himself up entirely to the service of the King. In 1521 he 
was knighted. He was made also Treasurer of the Exchequer, and a privy councillor. 



FEOM CHAUCER TO SPENSER. 55 

He greatly delighted the King by the brilliancy of his conversation. So great a 
favorite was he that Henry would often go unexpectedly to More's house, and spend 
the day with him. On the downfall of Wolsey, in 1529, More became Lord High 
Chancellor. This office he filled for three years with scrupulous integrity, and in a 
manner that elicited general applause. The only blot upon this part of his career is 
the harshness which he exercised towards Tyndale and his associates. 

JBis Downfall. — Of his sincerity and official integrity, More gave one signal exam- 
ple, which has indeed immortalized his memory. Henry is believed to have advanced 
More to the Chancellorship, with the hope of having the assistance of his reputation 
as a theologian and a scholar in bringing about the contemplated divorce from Cath- 
arine. Henry pressed the Chancellor for an opinion. More looked with horror upon 
a project which had been expressly denounced by the Pope, and rather than give it 
the sanction of his official co-operation, he asked leave to retire from the King's ser- 
vice. Thenceforth the vindictive monarch sought to ruin the friend whom he could 
not corrupt, and by the instrumentality of a pliant Parliament he succeeded in bring- 
ing his illustrious victim to the scaffold. More was beheaded, July 6, 1535, at the 
age of fifty-five. He submitted to the unrighteous sentence, not only with fortitude, 
but with a degree of cheerfulness approaching to gayety. 

His Character, — One of the most striking traits in Sir Thomas More's character 
was his disposition to jest. His jests do not seem to have contained anything offen- 
sive to morals or to taste, or inconsistent with the most scrupulous integrity and the 
most sincere piety. The disposition seems, in his case, to have arisen from a lively 
wit, combined with great buoyancy of natural feeling, and that inward satisfaction 
which springs from the sense of conscious rectitude of purpose and integrity of life. 
Whatever the cause, it is certain that he did jest on all occasions, not excepting the 
scaffold, where, just before receiving the fatal blow, he uttered a livelj' repartee. In 
his private and domestic relations, Sir Thomas More presented a character singularly 
beautiful. As his jesting was not allied to vice, so his piety was free from asceticism. 
If a liveliness of fancy, capable of eliciting sparks from the dullest materials, an eru- 
dition that attracted the attention even of Erasmus, a childlike simplicity and play- 
fulness of manner, coupled with the most sturdy and masculine integrity of conduct 
and purpose, a generosity of heart that could not say nay to a friend except at the 
call of conscience, a ready eloquence, a universal cheerfulness that begat its like in 
all with whom it came into contact, and a controlling piety that instead of being put 
on for set occasions seemed to interpenetrate every faculty of the man, 
" And give to every power a double power 
Above their functions and their offices," — 
if all these united make a character on which it is a pleasure to dwell, one may be 
excused perhaps for giving to the amiable author of The Utopia a somewhat larger 
space than is due to him merely as a writer. 

The Utopia. — This word, derived from the Greek ov [not] and Tonoi 
{place), and meaning literally "Nowhere," is the name given by Sir 
Thomas More to an imaginary island which he feigns to have been 
discovered by one of the companions of Amerigo Yespncci. This 
island is made the scene of Sir Thomas's famous political romance. 
Here he pictures a commonwealth in which all the laws and all the 
customs of society are wise and good. 



56 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

Skelton. 

John Skelton, 1460-1529, was a poet of some note in the 
early part of the reign of Henry VIII. Erasmus styled 
him "the light and ornament of English letters." 

Although this encomium is plainly undeserved, it yet shows that 
Skelton must have had abilities above the common order. 

History. — Skelton studied at Cambridge, and afterwards took orders in the 
Church. He was made poet-hxureate, but wore the crown with little pretension to dig- 
nity or grace. He had much reputation for learning and wit, and was tutor to the 
young Duke of York, afterwards Henry VIII. Hi- works are not very numerous, and 
to a modern reader not very attractive. Tlie chief of tUem are Colin Clout, Philip 
Sparrow, and Why Come Ye Not to Court, the last a satire on Cardinal Wolsey which 
succeeded in arousing that prelate's wrath very effectually. Skelton v/as obliged to 
take refuge in the sanctuary of Westminster. 

" Skelton is certainly not a poet, unless some degree of comic humor, and a torrent- 
like volubility of words in doggerel rhyme, can make one; but this uncommon fer- 
tility in a language so little copious as ours wa;s at this time, liespeaks a mind of some 
original vigor. Few English writers come nearer, in this respect, to Rabelais, Miiom 
Skelton preceded. His attempts in serious poetry are utterly contemptible ; but the 
satirical lines on Cardinal Wolsey were probably not ineffective. It is impossible to 
determine whether they were written before 1520. Though these are better known 
than any poem of Skelton's, his dirge on Philip Sparrow is the most comic and imag- 
inative." — Hallam. 

Latimer. 

Hugh Latimer, 1472-1555, a Bishop of the English 
Church in the time of Henry VIII., was celebrated beyond 
all the English Reformers for his pulpit eloquence. 

Latimer's Sermons have been published in 2 vols., 8vo. Tliey are 
remarkable for a familiarity and drollery of style, which would hardly 
be tolerated in polite congregations now, though it was very popular, 
and produced a powerful impression then. 

" Latimer, more than any other man, promoted the Reformation by his preaching. 
The straight-foi'ward honesty of his remarks, the liveliness of his illustrations, his 
homely wit, his racy manner, his manly freedom, the playfulness of his temper, tlie 
simplicity of his heart, the sincerity of his understanding, gave life and vigor to his 
sermons, when they were delivered, and render them now the most amusing produc- 
tions of that age, and to us perhaps the most valuable." — Gilpin. 

Cavendish. 

George Cavendish, 1557, gentleman usher to Cardinal Wolsey, 

left in manuscript a work, Tlie Negotiations of Thomas Wolsey, which 
is a valuable addition to the literature of the period. 



FEOM CHAUCER TO SPENSER. 57 

Cliaracter of the WorJi. — Cavendish was on the most intimate terms with both 
Wolsey and Henry. In a reign in which public affairs were to an extraordinary de- 
gree controlled by personal cajjrice and the ebullitions of individual passion, it neces- 
sarily happened that the real history of many of the most important transactions met 
no eye or ear but that of the gentleman usher. Though Cavendish was a friendly 
witness, he yet evidently recorded with fidelity and accuracy what he actually saw 
and heard. His memoirs of Wolsey, for that is the real character of the work, are of 
great value, therefore, to the historian, as containing authentic information on 
many important points connected with that reign. The work, moreover, is written 
in a sort of gossiping, conversational style, that makes it pleasant reading. Another 
circumstance gives special value to this work. His account of Henry and Wolsey 
was the one followed by Shakspeare, in the play of Henry YIII., many of the pas- 
sages in Shakspeare being Cavendish's prose turned into verse. 

Berners. 

John Bourchier, Lord Berners, 1532, Chancellor of the Ex- 
chequer under Henry VIII., has connected his name very pleasantly 
with literature by his translations from the old chronicles, and particu- 
larly by his translation of Froissart. The translation was made at 
the request of King Henry. 

" A soldier, a statesman, and a scholar, this nobleman was singularly well adapted 
for the task which he undertook. Indeed, considering the period of its completion, 
it was a sort of literary miracle." — Dibdin. 

Sib John Bellenden, 1550, was a Scotch historian and poet 

of some repute in the reign of James V. of Scotland. 

While Berners was translating Froissart for his royal master in England, Bellenden 
was doing a like office for James in Scotland. At the request of the latter, Bellenden 
translated a Latin work, " The Chronicles of Scotland," and the first five books of 
Livy. The Chronicle, printed in 1536, is worthy of note as being the earliest specimen 
of prose in the northern part of the island, and likewise as containing the story fol- 
lowed by Shakspeare in the tragedy of Macbeth. 

Barclay. 

Alexander Barclay, 1552, is one of the names of poetical note 

in the first half of the sixteenth century. 

Barclay employed his pen chiefly in translation. His principal work is I7ie SJiq) of 
Foolx, from the German of Brandt, with niimerous adaptations to English manners, 
giving a variety of follies which he found among his own countrymen. The satire 
consists in giving a description of each of the passengers on board the ship. The first 
Fool described is The Bookworm, who begins his story as follows : 
" Lo in likewise of bookes I have store, 
But few I read, and fewer understand; 
I follow not their doctrine, nor their lore, 
It is enough to have a book in hand : 
It were ton much to be in such a land, 
For to be bound to look within the book : 
I am content on the fair covering to look." 



58 ENGLISH LITEKATUEE. 

" All ancient satirical writings, even those of an inferior cast, have their merit, and 
deserve attention, as they transmit pictures of familiar manners, and preserve popu- 
lar customs. In this light, at least, Barclay's Ship of Fools, which is a general satire 
on the times, will be found entertaining. Nor must it he denied, that his language 
is more cultivated than that of many of his contemporaries, and that he contributed 
his share to the improvement of the English phraseology." — Warton. 

V/yatt. 

Sir Thomas Wyatt, 1503-1542, was an accomplished di- 
plomatist and statesman in the reign of Henry VIII. Wyatt 
is also favorably known as a poet. 

Wyatt wrote no long poems. His effusions are chiefly amatory, or 
satirical. 

Sis Career. — Wyatt entered Cambridge at a very early age, was graduated, and, 
through strong i'amily influence, rose high in Court favor under Henry Till. During 
the stormy time between the outbreak of the Reformation and the peace of Augsburg, 
Wyatt was ambassador for two years at the Court of Charles T. of Germany. Once 
or twice under a cloud, he finally died high in the King's -favor. 

Sis Poetry. — Wyatt, like so many of the statesmen of that day, also cultivated the 
muses. He was an accomplished cavalier and a writer of verses after the approved 
fashion. He is generally classed with Surrey, and their poems have often been pub- 
lished in the same volume. Wyatt's love-poetry is tender and graceful, but somewhat 
spoiled by the conceits of his Italian models. His satires are more idiomatic and more 
spirited. 

" We must agree with a critic above quoted that Wyatt co-operated with Surrey in 
having corrected the roughness of our poetic style. But Wyatt, although sufficiently 
distinguished from the common versifiers of his age, is confessedly inferior to Surrey 
in harmony of numbers, perspicuity of expression, and facility of phraseology. Nor 
is he equal to Surrey in elegance of sentiment, in nature and sensibility, nis feelings 
are disguised by aifectation and disfigured by conceit. His declarations of passion 
are also embarrassed by wit and fancy, and his style is not intelligible in proportion 

as it is careless and unHdorned The truth is, his genius was of the moral 

and didactic species ; and his poems abound more in good sense, satire, and observa- 
tions on life, than in pathos or imagination." — Warton. 

Surrey. 

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, 1516-1547, one of the 
brilliant ornaments of the reign of Henry VIH., is distin- 
guished in letters by his Sonnets and Songs, and especially 
by his being the first writer of Blank Verse in English. 

Surrey translated into blank verse the first and fourth books of 
Virgil's iEneid. He also was the first Englishman that wrote Sonnets 
after the Italian model. 



FEOM CHAUCER TO SPENSER. 59 

Bis Career. —Surrey studied at Oxford; in 1535 lie married Ladj' Frances Yere; 
he served in the wars of Henry VIII. against France; fell into disfavor, and, in 1547, 
was beheaded upon the absurd charge of high treason. 

Sis Poetry . — Surrey was the composer of a number of songs and sonnets, which 
have appeared in many editions. His sonnets are mostly dedicated to "The Fair Ger- 
aldine," the daughter of Gerald Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare. Besides these original 
poems, Surrey translated the fourth book of Yirgil in " strange metre." This " strange 
metre" is blank verse, — its first appearance in English literature. 

" Surrey is the first who introduced blank verse into our English poetry. The trans- 
lation by Surrey of the second book of the ^neid, in blank verse, is among the chief of 
his productions. No one had, before bis time, known how to translate or imitate with 
appropriate expression. But the structure of his verse is not very harmonious, and 
the sense is rarely carried beyond the line." — Uallam. 

" Surrey, for his justness of thought, correctness of style, and purity of expression, 
may justly be pronounced the first English classical poet. lie is unquestionably the 

first polite writer of love verses in English In the sonnets of Surrey we 

are surprised to find nothing of that metaphysical cast which marks the Italian poets, 
his supposed masters, especially Petmrch. Surrey's sentiments are for the most part 
natural and unaffected ; arising from his own feelings and dictated by present circum- 
stances. His poetry is alike unembarrassed by learned allusions and elaborate con- 
ceits." — IFarto?i. 

Tusser. 

Thomas Tusser, 1523-1580, is one of the earliest English 
didactic poets. 

Tusser was born at Eivenliall, Essex, and " was successively musi- 
cian, schoolmaster, serving -man, husbandman, grazier, poet, more 
skilful in all than tliriving in any vocation," Fuller. He wrote A 
Hundred Oood Points of Husbandry, being a practical treatise, in 
rhyme, on farming. 

" It must be acknowledged, that this old English georgic has much more of the sim- 
plicity of ilesiod than of the elegance of Virgil ; and a modern reader would suspect 
that many of its salutary maxims originally decorated the margins, and illustrated 
the calendars, of an ancient almanac. It is without invocations, digressions, and de- 
scriptions : no pleasing pictures of rural imagery are drawn from meadows covered 
with flocks and fields waving with corn, nor are Pan and Ceres once named. Yet it is 
valuable, as a genuine picture of the agriculture, the rural arts, and the domestic 
economy and customs, of our industrious ancestors."— Warton. 

Harrington. 
Sir John Harrington, 1561-1612, is chiefly known for his metrical 
translation of Ariosfo's Orlando Fan'oso, the first version of tliat work 
in English. 

Harrington also published a collection of Epif/ram.'!, and Xugx An'iquie, a miscella- 



60 ENGLISH LITERATUEE. 

neons collection of papers in prose and verse, composed in the times of Henry VIIL, 
Mary, Elizabeth, and James I. 

Leland. 

John Leland, 1552, was the earliest of the race of great 

English antiquaries, and therefore deserves mention here, although he 
wrote mostly in Latin. 

JBLis Career. — Leland was born near the close of the reign of Henry Til., and 
was educated at Cambridge. He was chaplain to Henry VIII., and received also from 
that sovereign the singvilar title of Royal Antiquary. Under this title, he was em- 
powered, in 1533, by royal commission, to search for objects of antiquity in the libra- 
ries and archives of all cathedrals, abbeys, and priories, throughout the kingdom. In 
the exercise of this office he spent six years, travelling through England and Wales, 
rummaging old manuscripts, and visiting remains of ancient buildings and monu- 
ments. After completing this visitation, he returned to London, and began arranging 
and methodizing his vast collection. But the fatigue of too intense study rendered 
him insane, and he remained in this condition till his death about two years after. 

His Works — Leland, besides some smaller pieces published during his life, had 
ready for publication a most important work in Latin, Commentarii de Scriptorihus 
Britaniiicis, Notes on British Writers, which was printed in 1709, in 2 vols. 8vo. The 
great mass of his materials, however, were left in manuscript, in their undigested con- 
dition, until the early part of the last centurj', when they were arranged and pub- 
lished by a kindred spirit, the antiquary Thomas Hearne, 1678-1735. Hearne edited 
Leland's work De Rfhus Britcmnicis Collectanea, 6 vols. 8vo., and his Itinerary, in 9 vols. 
Svo. The last named is in English, and is the work of chief importance. 

Elyot. 

Sir Thomas Elyot, 1546, a diplomatist in the reign of Henry 

VIIL, wrote many works, of which, however, only one. The Governor, 
is now much known. 

Elyot, though not an antiquary himself, was an intimate friend of 
the antiquary Leland, as also of Sir Thomas More. 

His Character and WorTts. — Elyot was a man of various and profound learn- 
ing. He was a favorite with Henry VIII., and was employed on important embassies. 
He wrote Tlie Governor; Apology for Good Women; The Banquet of Sapience; The 
Education of Children; Discourse of Christian War and Single Combat, being an essay 
on duelling ; A Latin and English Dictionary ; and a large number of works translated 
from the Greek and Latin, or rather made up of translated extracts from the ancient 
authors. The work first named. The Governor, passed through many editions. It was 
a treatise on education, containing useful hints on that subject, and especially note- 
worthy as deprecating the terrible cruelties then prevalent both in school and family 
government. 

Bale. 

John Bale, 1495-1563, Bishop of Ossory, was a prolific writer, mostly 
on controversial theology, during the reign of Henry VIIL, Edward 
VL, Mary, and Elizabeth. 



< 



FROM CHAUCER TO SPEXSER. 61 

Sis Coreer. — Bale was a zealous reformer, and a partisan of Essex, and on the 
downfall of the latter he took refuge in Flanders. On the accession of Edward YI., 
Bale returned to England, and was made Bishop. On the death of Edward and the 
accession of Marj-, he was again obliged to flee to the continent. Undjer Elizabeth, he 
returned once more to England, but preferred a prebendal stall in the cathedral 
church of Canterbury to regaining his bishopric. 

Sis WorJcs. — Bale was a man of learning, and a voluminous writer. His prin- 
cipal work is in Latin. Scriptonim Illustrium Majoris Britannise Catcdogus. A Catalogue 
of the Illustrious Writers of Great Britain. He wrote, however, a great deal in 
English and for popular effect. He was the author, among other things, of nineteen 
Miracle Plays. These Miracle Plays were a part of the machinery by which the early 
reformers sought to influence the popular mind. They were dramatic entertain- 
ments, founded on parts of Scripture history, and were often played in the churches 
and on Sunday. Two of his plays, John tJie Baptist, and GocPs Promises, Avhich were 
publicly acted on Sunday, gave special offence to the Catholics. Of Bale's Miracle Plays 
eleven were comedies on scenes in the life of Christ, as on his Baptism, his Passion, &c. 



EXTRACT. 
On Prelates that do not Preach. 

[X.B. — The spelling has been modernized] 

But now, for the default of unpreaching prelates, methink I could 
guess what might be said for excusing them. They are so troubled 
with lordly living, they be so pleased in palaces, couched in courts, 
. . . burdened with ambassages, . . . that they cannot attend 
it. They are otherwise occupied, some in the King's matters, some are 
ambassadors, some of the Privy Council, some to furnish the Court, 
some are Lords of the Parliament, some are Presidents, and some Comp- 
trollers of mints. Well, well ! 

Is this their duty? Is this their office? Is this their calling? 
Should we have ministers of the church to be comptrollers of the 
mints ? Is this a meet office for a priest that hath cure of souls ? Is 
this his charge ? I would here ask one question : I would fain know 
who comptrolleth the devil at home, at his parish, while he comp- 
trolleth the mint? If the Apostles might not leave off preaching to 
tlie deacons, shall one leave it for minting ? 

I cannot tell you, but the saying is, that since priests have been 
minters, money hath been worse than it was before ; and they say that 
the evilness of money hath made all things dearer. 

Is there never a nobleman to be a Lord President, but it must be a 

preliite? Is there never a wise man in the realm to be a comptroller 

of the mint? I speak it to your shame, I speak it to your shame. 

If there be never a wise man, make a water-bearer, a tinker, a cobler, 

6 



62 ENGLISH LITEEATUEE. 

a slave, a page, comptroller of the mint. Make a mean gentleman, a 
groom, a yeoman, make a poor beggar Lord President. . . . 

A bishop hath his office, a flock to teach, to look unto, and therefore 
he cannot meddle with another office, which alone requireth a whole 
man. He should therefore give it over to whom it is meet, and labor 
in his own business, as Paul v.rriteth to the Thessalonians : Let every 
man do his owe business and follow his calling. Let the priest preach, 
and the nobleman handle the temporal matters. . . . 

And now I would ask a strange question. Who is the most diligent 
bishop and prelate in all England, that passeth all the rest in doing 
his office? I can tell, for I know him, who it is; I know him well. 
But now I think I see you testing and hankering that I should name 
him. There is one that passeth all the others, and is the most diligent 
prelate and preacher in all England. And will ye know who it is ? 
I will tell you. It is the Devil. He is the most diligent preacher of 
all others ; he is never out of his diocese ; he is never from his cure ; 
ye shall never find him unoccupied ; he is ever in his parish ; he keep- 
eth residence at all times ; ye shall never find him out of the way ; call 
for him when you will, he is ever at home, the diligentest preacher in 
all the realm. ... 

He goeth about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. 
T would have this text well viewed and examined, every word of it. 
Circuit, — he goeth about, in every corner of his diocese. He goeth on 
visitation daily. He leaveth no place of his cure unvisited. He walk- 
eth round from place to place, and ceaseth not. Sicut leo, — as a lion, 
that is, strongly, boldly, and proudly, straightly, and fiercely, with 
haughty looks, with his proud countenance, with his stately trappings. 
Mugiens, — roaring, for he letteth not slip any occasion to speak, or to 
roar out, when he seeth his time. Qucerens, — he goeth about seeking, 
and not sleeping, as our bishops do, but he seeketh diligently, he 
searcheth diligently all corners, whereas he may have his prey ; he 
roveth abroad in every place of his diocese, he standeth not still, he 
is never at rest, but ever at hand with his plough that it may go for- 
ward. There was never such a preacher in England as he is. — 
Bishop Latimer : From the Sermon on the Ploughers. 





CHAPTER V. 

Spenser and Contemporary Poets. 

The authors brought together in this Chapter are in the 
main associated with the time of the poet Spenser, and with 
the reign of Queen Elizabeth, 1558-1603, or the latter half 
of the sixteenth century. 

This period is known in history as the secondary stage of the Eef- 
ormation. Among the great events of this period are the Spanish 
Armada, and the rise of the Dutch Eepublic. Among its great names 
are Elizabeth, and her two leading counsellors, Cecil and Walsingham, 
Mary Queen of Scots, Philip II. of Spain, the Dukes of Alva and 
Parma, Henry of Navarre, Conde, Coligny, and William the Silent. 

Note. — Many of the authors in this chapter run back into the reigns of Mary, 
1553-1558, and of Edward. VI., 15-1:7-1553, or forward into that of James, 1603-1625. 
It will be found, however, on examination, that these authors did their chief work in 
the reign of Elizabeth. 

Spenser. 

Edmund Spenser, 1553-1599, is the next great name in 
English literature, after that of Chaucer. His principal 
work, The Fairy Queen, is one of the chief treasures of the 
language. This poem adds an undying lustre to the reign 
of Queen Elizabeth. It is of itself sufficient to make any 
age famous. 

Early Career. — Spenser was born in London, in humble circumstances. He 
was educatedat Cambridge, where he made the acquaintance of Gabriel Harvey. After 
leaving the University in 1576, at the age of twenty-three, he spent two years in 
the north of England. At the end of that time, he returned to London, and published 

63 



64 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

in 1579 his first volume, The Shepherds' Calendar. This is a pastoral poem, in twelve 
eclogues, modelled to some extent after the eclogues of Virgil. 

Connection with Sidney and Leicester. — Ahout this time Spenser made 
the acquaintance of Sir Philip Sidney, and of Sidney's uncle, the powerful Earl of 
Leicester, and thenceforward his fortunes are mixed up a good deal with the affairs 
of that illustrious family. Through this source he obtained, in 1580, the appointment 
of secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, and some grants in connection with it 
of considerable pecuniary value. In 1586, he received from the Crown, through the 
interposition, it is supposed, of Sir Philip Sidney, a grant of three thousand acres of 
land in Ireland, being part of the forfeited estates of the Earl of Desmond. 

Connectioti with Maleigh. — "While Spenser was living at Kilcolman Castle, 
on his Irish estates, he received a visit from Sir Walter Raleigh, who had obtained 
from the Crown ten thousand acres of the same forfeited estates. During this visit, 
Spenser read to Raleigh so much of the Fairy Queen as was then written, namely the 
first three books. By the advice of Raleigh, Spenser went forthwith to London, and 
published these three books, in the beginning of 1500. The reception of the work was 
enthusiastic. It was peculiarly adapted to the stately solemnities of the age and 
court of Queen Elizabeth, and it brought the author not only immediate fame, but a 
substantial pension from the Queen. 

Other Publications. — In the following year. 1591, Spenser published another 
volume, containing several minor poems : The Ruins of Time, a requiem upon his de- 
ceased patron, the Earl of Leicester, The Tears of the Muses, VirgiVs Gnat, Mother Hub- 
herd's Tale, The L'uins of Home, Visions, and Muiopotmos, or The Fate of the Butterfly. 
These were followed, in the next year, by the publication of Dapnaida, an elegy upon 
the Lady Douglas Howard. 

Meturn to Ireland. — After spending some time in London, attending to these 
various publications, Spenser returned to his Irish home, and thence, in 1595, sent 
forth his next publication, Colin Clout 's Come Home Again. In this, under pastoral 
names, as Colin, Hobbinol, Melissa, Cynthia, and so on, he celebrates his various dis- 
tinguished friends at Court, and especially dwells at great length upon the virtues and 
glories of the Queen. The same year witnessed the appearance of another volume, 
contmiiing Amoretti or Sonnets, and the Epithalamium. The former are all addressed 
to the woman whom he was about to make his wife, and the latter is in celebration 
ot his marriage. It is the noblest spousal verse in the language. 

Latest Publications, — In 1596, Spenser went again to London to superintend the 
publication of the next three books of the Fairy Queen. He also published the Pro- 
tlwLlamion, in reference to the expected marriage of two noble ladies of his acquaint- 
ance, and his four Hymns, two in honor of Love and Beauty, and two in honor of 
Heavenly Love and Beauty. These Hymns, so called, are long poems, containing 
nearly twelve hundred lines. 

His Misfortunes and Death. — The Englishmen, Raleigh, Spenser, and others, 
who had been put in possession of the forfeited estates of the Irish rebels, were neces- 
sarily odious to the Irish peasantry. This irritation became at length so great, that 
in 1598 it broke out into open insurrection. The insurgents attacked Kilcolman Cas- 
tle, plundered, and set fire to it. Spenser and his wife escaped, but a new-born infant 
perished in the flames. He took refuge in London, and there, after a few months of 
painful anxiety, died, at the age of forty -five. He was buried in Westminster Abbey. 

Plan of the Fairy Queen. — Spenser's chief work, The Fairy Queen, 
was left unfinished. His plan contemplated twelve Books, each Book 



SPENSER AND CONTEMPORARY POETS. 65 

composed of twelve Cantos. Only six Books were completed. The 
poem is of the allegorical kind. Each book has a story and a hero of 
its own, with a series of connected adventures, all intended to illus- 
trate some one great moral virtue. Thus Book I. is The Legend of the 
Eed-Cross Knight, or of Holiness ; Book II. is the Legend of Sir Guy- 
on, or of Temperance ; Book III., The Legend of Britomart, or of 
Chastity; Book IV., The Legend of Cambel and Triamond, or of 
Friendship ; Book V., The Legend of Artegal, or of Justice ; and Book 
VI., The Legend of Sir Calidore, or of Courtesy. Spenser nowhere 
gives a list of the virtues intended to be celebrated in the remaining 
six books. Besides the heroes and heroines of the several books, there 
is one superior hero. Prince Arthur, who intervenes in each book, to 
rescue its particular hero in his extremity. This common hero repre- 
sents Magnificence, or the embodiment of all human excellence, and 
is in the end to be united to the Queen, Gloriana ; in other words, 
heroism is to be glorified. 

Character of his Poetry. — As a scene-painter, Spenser is nnrivalled. No poem 
in the language, no poem probably in any language, eqnals the Fairy Queen in the 
number, variety, and gorgeous splendor of its scenes. The author's power of inven- 
tion seems exhaustless, and he fairly revels in the never ending pictures of bewilder- 
ing enchantment which come at his bidding. From the very luxuriance of his imagi- 
nation, however, he often forgets himself, and loses the thread of his story ; and he 
lacks the exactness of thought which marks the work of that other great prince of 
dreamers, John Bunyan. 

Mis Versification. — As a versiiier, Spenser is wonderful for the freedom, variety, 
and sweetness of his rhythms. His words come pouring forth in an endless tide of 
song. His marvellous facility in versifying, however, made him careless; and he 
lacks accordingly something of that perfect iini^h in his rhythms which is to be found 
in some other masters of song. The stanza used in the Fairy Queen is one invented 
by the author, and is known as the Spenserian Stanza. It seems especially suited for 
the kind of chivalrous adventures which it is employed to describe. This stanza has 
been much used by later poets, particularly by Byron. 

Sidney. 

Sir Philip vSidney, 1554-1586, was one of the special or- 
naments of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. He was pos- 
sessed by nature, not only of high talents, but of a certain 
nobleness of disposition which made him the object of 
almost universal admiration. 

His Education. — Sidney's education was ordered with the greatest 
care ; and being connected by birth and alliance with the most distin- 
guished families in the kingdom, he had no lack of o])portunitics for 
6* E 



66 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

displaying Ms extraordinary abilities to the best advantage. He at- 
tended for a time at Oxford, and then at Cambridge, and afterwards 
went abroad for the purpose of study, in connection with travel, taking 
with him letters of introduction from his uncle, the Earl of Leicester. 
He visited France, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, and Italy. In Italy 
he spent eight months in reading Cicero, Plutarch, Petrarch, Boccaccio, 
Dante, and Ariosto. 

Festivities. — He returned to England in -ISTo, in time to participate in the gor- 
geous festivities at Keuilworth Castle, which have been celehrated by the genius of Sir 
AValter Scott. 

Embassy to Germany — In the following year, being only twenty-two years old, 
he was sent by Queen Elizabeth, nominally on a visit of condolence to the Emperor of 
Germany, but really to concert measures with the German Princes for a league with 
England in behalf of Protestantism. The abilities displayed by him in this delicate 
affair gained him the highest commendations from the veteran and astute Walsingham. 

Letter to the Queen. — In the following year, Sidney addressed a letter of remon- 
strance to the Queen against the project of her marriage to the Duke of Anjou. Tl>is 
was a bold step certainly, considering the hot nature of the Tudor blood. But in- 
stances are not wanting in which both Heni-y and Elizal eth seemed rather pleased 
than otherwise, with a freedom of speech, which in their ordinary moods, and from 
ordinary persons, would have cost a man his liberty, if not his life. Sidney, in this 
as in many other instances, seems to have known instinctively just how far to go 
without giving offence. 

Retirement, — Soon after this a quarrel occurred between him and the Earl of 
Oxford, which led Sidney to live for a time in retirement, at Wilton, the seat of his 
brother-in-law, the Earl of Pembroke. While there witli his sister, and primarily for 
her amusement, he wrote one of his two most famous productions. 

The Arcadia. — The Arcadia, or as he himself styles it, "The 
Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia," written during his temporary re- 
tii-ement from Court, is a sort of philosophical romance, and was not 
finished by himself The Countess, after his death, revised and arranged 
the manuscript, and published it with a continuation by Markham. 

Estimate of the A7'cadia. — The Arcadia was instantly and universally popu- 
lar. Some part of this popularity was due no doubt to the singular and romantic 
feeling of personal regard entertained towards the author by his contemporaries. In 
the course of a century, the work fell into almost universal neglect, and began at 
length to be the subject even of contempt and ridicule. Horace Walpole characterized 
it as " a tedious, lamentable, pedantic, pastoral romance, which the patience of a j-oung 
virgin in love cannot now wade through." Mr. Hazlitt, a more recent critic, has ex- 
pressed a condemnation equally SMceping. There has been springing up of late, 
however, a disposition to regard this once celebrated performance with greater favor. 
Those readers whose taste has been formed upon the stimulating and highly seasoned 
productions of the modern sensational school, will of course find Sidney's work pe- 
dantic and prosy. Still there are some minds, even now, who tire of this perpetual 
excitement, and who would not be ashamed to lay aside The Mysteries of Paris, or 
Griffith Gaunt, to find a calm and pensive enjoyment in the perusal of the Arcadia, 



/ 



SPENSER AND CONTEMPORARY POETS. 67 

The Defence of Poesie. — The other principal prose work of Sidney, 
The Defence of Poesie, was written not long after, in 1581, the author 
being then twenty-seven years old. It has received the commendation 
of the highest critics, and is still occasionally read. Though written 
in a style now antiquated, it is in some respects to this day the best 
argument extant on the subject of which it treats, 

Sidney's fame as an author now rests upon these two works. Neither of them seems 
to have been much esteemed by himself, and neither of them was published until 
after his death. 

Bis Poetry. — In his own time, Sidney was in high repute as a poet. His Son- 
nets, particularly, were greatly admired. They are mostly addressed to the Lady 
Penelope Devereux, whom he celebrates under the name of Stella, signing himself 
Astrophel. The reader will find in them abundance of artificial conceits and elaborate 
nothings. 

Military Career. — Sidney's great ambition was to be distinguished as a soldier. 
He obtained a commiind in the war then going on in Holland, but his career was 
brought to a speedy termination. He was mortally wounded in the battle of Zutphen, 
and after lingeriug for a few days, died in the arms of his wife, Oct. 7, 1586, in the 33d 
year of his age. 

Sis Character. — Sidney was the intimate friend and patron of Spenser, and in 
his character and life was the actual embodiment of this great poet's ideal. The ex- 
traordinary hold which he had r,pou the inindri of his contemporaries can be accounted 
for only by supposing him to have been gifted to an unusual degree with those enno- 
bling qualities which Spenser has shadowed forth in Sir Calidore, or The Legend of 
Courtesy. Sidney was indeed distinguished even as an author: but his main distinc- 
tion grew out of his character as a man; — as one who could be a graceful courtier 
without duplicity, a man of fashion without frivolity, a warrior and a hero without 
loss of rank in the Court of the Muses ; one who was successful in almost every walk 
of honorable enterprise without incurring the envy or reproach of his competitors; 
one, in whom the most ordinary affairs of life became invested, in the eyes of his 
countrymen, with some peculiar fitness — whose every sentiment was a melody — 
whose every act was rhj'thmical — whose whole life indeed was one continued poem. 
" He trod from his cradle to his grave amid incense and flowers, and he died in a 
dream of glory." 

Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke, 1552-1621, is now 
known to history, partly as the sister of Sir Philip Sidney, 
and partly for the epitaph upon her, written by Ben Jonson : 

" Underneath this sable hearse 

Lies the subject of all verse: — 
. Sidney's sister ! Pembroke's mother ! 

Death, ere tliou hast killed another. 

Fair, and learned, and good as she. 

Time shall throw his dart at thee!" 



68 ENGLISH LITE E AT U RE. 

The Countess M-as intimately associated with her brother in his literary labors, and 
-was herself the author of several pieces, original and translated. She -wrote A Poem 
on Our Saviour's Passion; A Pastoral Dialogue in Praise of Astraea [Queen Elizabeth] ; 
An Elegy on Sir Philip Sidney, etc. 

FuLKE Greville, Lofd Brooke, 1554-1628, a nobleman 
and scholar in the days of Elizabeth, is associated with the 
memory of Sir Philip Sidney. 

Brooke wrote a good deal, both in prose and verse, but is more noted 
for his passionate admiration of the works of Sidney than for his own 
performances. Besides a Life of Sidney, he wrote two Tragedies, Ala- 
ham and Mustapha, and several didactic poems. 

" 'J'he titles of Lord Brooke's poems, A Treatise of Human Learning, A Treatise of 
Monarchy, A Treatise of Ileligion, An Inquisition upon Fame and Honor, lead us to 
anticipate more of sense than fancy. In this we are not deceived ; his mind was preg- 
nant with deep reflection upon multifarious learning, but he struggles to give utter- 
ance to thouglits which he had not fully endowed with words, and amidst the shackles 
of rhyme and metre which he had not learned to manage. Hence, of all our poets, he 
may be reckoned the most obscure ; in aiming at condensation, he becomes elliptical 
beyond the bounds of the language, and his rhymes, being forced for the sake of 
sound, leave all meaning behind. Lord Brooke's poeti-y is chiefly worth notice as an 
indication of that thinking spirit upon political science which was to produce the ripe 
speculations of Uobbes, and Harrington, and Locke." — Hallam. 

Gabriel Harvey, 1545-1630, a writer of some note in 
his own day, is now chiefly known for his connection with 
Spenser and Sidney. 

Harvey was the senior of Spenser, and had for a time considerable influence over 
him. Harvey endeavored to persuade Spenser to embark in a project to remodel Eng- 
lish verse, and to introduce the longs and shorts of the classical authors. But Spen- 
ser's instinctive genius broke loose from these arbitrary trammels. Harvey's Letters 
and Sonnets are valuable for the notices which they contain of many of his literaiy 
contemporaries. 

Raleigh. 
Sir Walter Raleigh, 1552-1618, is famous as a courtier, 
an adventurer, and a writer. 

Early Career. — Raleigh was born in Devonshire, studied at Oxford, 
served as a volunteer in France and the Netherlands on the Huguenot 
side for a number of years, and afterwards in Ireland, during Des- 
mond's rebellion. He attracted the attention of Queen Elizabeth, as 
tradition has it, by laying down his cloak as an impromptu carpet for 
her majesty over a muddy place. Be this as it may, Ealeigh became 



SPEXSER AXD COXTEMPORARY POETS. 69 

one of the roval favorites, was knighted, and appointed to various high 
and lucrative offices in the kingdom. 

Colonization Schemes. — In 1584 Raleigh received letters-patent empowering 
him to colonize and govern any unoccupied territories that he might find in North 
America. In that same year one of his parties discovered the land which was after- 
wards named Virginia in honor of the Queen. Another party made an unsuccessful 
attempt to colonize Roanoke Island. The introduction of tobacco and the potato into 
Europe is commonlj' ascribed to Raleigh, 

Other Adventui'es. — In 1558, Raleigh took an active part in the contests with 
the Spanish Armada. Having lost favor with the Queen by his marriage with Miss 
Throgmorton, one of the Queen's maids-of-houor, he tried to compensate for the dis- 
grace by acquiring fresh laurels as a discoverer. Accordingly, in 1595 he sailed in 
search of the fabulotts land of gold, Eldorado, and ascended the river Orinoco for 
nearly sixty leagues. An account of his expedition he published in the same year. 
He regained the royal favor, and seiTed as rear-admiral at the taking of Cadiz, in 1596. 

DisliJced bj/ tfanies. — When James I. became king, Raleigh fell again into dis- 
grace. He Mas accused of being an accomplice in Cobham's treason, and convicted 
in 1603, on scanty proof. Instead of being executed, he was confined in prison until 
1615, when he was released conditionally. During this long confinement he wrote his 
most celebrated work, The History of the World. 

Zittst Exjtedition. — The condition of his release was that he should open a gold- 
mine in Guiana. On the way the squadron attacked the Spaniards near St. Thomas. 
The attempt to discover the gold-mine was unsuccessful, and the expedition returned 
in 1618. The Spaniards complained of the outrage done to them, and King James, 
who was anxious at that time to keep on good terms with them, revived the former 
condemnation for high treason pronounced fifteen years before. Raleigh was executed 
October 28, 1613. 

Personal Character. — Of Raleigh as a man and an adventurer it is scarcely yet 
time to speak. The history of the reign of Queen Elizabeth has not yet been written ; 
fresh investigations are showing more and more the uncertainty of former judgments 
upon the men and events of that day. Sir Walter Raleigh, in particular, needs a care- 
ful and impartial biographer. The outlines of his life are clear enough, but there is 
a halo of fable about manj' of the details, and also about the personal character of the 
man and his motives. It will be wise, therefore, to suspend judgment until more 
positive information is attainable. 

Soiv Megarded hy his Contemporar-ies. — He was looked upon as the flower 
of courtesy in an age when court life was the prominent phase of English society; 
he was, for the times, an accomplished scholar, a bold adventurer, a lover of the 
muses, and a friend of the poet Spenser, who honored him with one of his sweetest 
sonnets. Raleigh is thus tbe type of the England of the sixteenth century, — bold, 
hasty, gallant, not over-scrupulous in the choice of means, but genial in manners, 
and, with all its faults, full of life and character. 

Literary Merits. — Ealeigh's poems have been collected by Sir S. E. 
Brydges. The best known of them are: The Country's Recreations, 
PhiUida's Love Call, T/ic Silent Lover, The Shepherd's Description of 
Love, &c. It may be said of Kaleigh that he just fell short of becom- 
ing a fine lyric poet. His life was too irregular, and left him too little 
leisure to develop his poetical talents. His greatest prose work is un- 



70 _ ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

questionably his History of the World, which, however, is brought 
down only to the end of the Macedonian Empire. Although, of 
course, superseded in matters of fact by later works, it is regarded as a 
model of style, and the pioneer of the great English school of histor- 
ical writers. It is clear and spirited, acute without being taken up in 
trivialities, and is pervaded with the sweet spirit of philosophic culture. 

Raleigh's Letter to his Wife, written in 1603, -wlien he was expecting speedy execu- 
tion, is a woudeifiil example of the combination of affection and simple dignity. 

"The Greek and Roman story is told more fully and exactly (in the History of the 
TTorld) than hj any earlier English author, and with a plain eloquence that has given 
the book a classical reputation in our laugiiage, tbough from its length, and the want 
of that critical sifting of facts which we now justly demand, it is not greatly read. 
There is little now obsolete in the words of Raleigh, nor, to any great degree, in his 
turns of phrase ; the periods, when pains liave been taken with them, show that arti- 
ficial structure which we find in Sidney and Hooker; he is less pedantic than most of 
his contemporaries, seldom low, never affected.'" — Hallam. 

Saekville, 

Thomas Saekville, 1536-1608, Earl of Dorset, and Lord 
High Treasurer of Eoglaud, was a man of note in letters, 
as well as in affairs of state. 

The Mirrour for Magistrates. — In 1557, Saekville formed the design 
of a poem, entitled The Mirrour for Magistrates, of which he wrote 
only The Induction, and one Legend, that on the life of Henry Staf- 
ford, Duke of Buckingham. 

Flan of the Poeui. — In imitation of Dante and some others of his predecessors, 
Saekville lays the scene of his poem in tlie infernal regions, to which he descends 
under the guidance of an allegorical personage named Sorrow. It was his object to 
make all the great persons of English history, from the Conquest downwards, pass here 
in review, and each tell his own story, as a warning to existing statesmen. 

JETotv Comiileted . — Other duties compelling the poet, after he had written what 
has been stated, to break ofi", he committed the completion of the work to two poets 
of inferior note, William Baldwin and George Ferrers. 

Character of the Poem. — " The whole poem is one of a very remarkable kind 
for the age, and tbe part executed by Saekville himself exhibits in some parts a 
strength of description and a power of drawing allegorical characters, scarcely inferior 
to Si:)enser." — Chambers. 

Other Poetrjf. — Saekville also was the author, jointly perhaps with Thomas 
Norton, of the first regular English Tragedj\ Ferrex and Porrex, called also Gorboduc. 

George Ferrers, 1512-1579, was an Oxford scholar, and was dis- 
tinguished in his day for his legal knowledge and for his literary cul- 
ture. 



SPEKSER AND CONTEMPORARY POETS. 71 

The chief distinction of Ferrers is that he -was one of tlie contributoi-s to the Mirrour 
for Magistrates. He wrote for this the following six poetical chronicles : The Fall of 
Eobert Trevilian ; The Tragedy of Thomas of AVoodstock, Dul^e of Gloucester; The 
Tragedy of Richard II. ; The Story of Dame Eleanor Cobham ; The Story of Humphrey 
Plantagenet ; The Tragedy of Edward, Duke of Somerset. 

William Baldwin, 1564, a scholar and printer of some ce- 
lebrity, was one of the contributors to the Mirrour for Magistrates. 

He wrote also, A Treatise on Moral Philosophy ; The Canticles or Ballads of Solomon, 
in English Metres; The Use of Adages, Similes, and Proverbs ; and Beware the Cat. 

Warner. 

William Warner, 1558-1609, a lawyer during the reign 
of Elizabeth, wrote a long poem, Albion's England, which 
was exceedingly popular at that time, but has since fallen 
into neglect. 

Plan of his Poem. — Albion's England is a narrative poem, pro- 
fessing to give the history of England from the Deluge to the time of 
James I. It is full of lively and amusing incidents taken from the 
old chronicles. It is divided into thirteen books, and contains nearly 
ten thousand fourteen-syllable lines. 

Its Character. — Warner in his day was ordinarily coupled with Spenser, the 
two being spoken of as the Homer and Tirgil of English literature. Spenser was the 
poet of the hall and the boudoir, Warner of the kitchen. His thoughts and style 
present a perfect contrast to those of Spenser. While the latter is full of mysterious 
and stately splendors, suited to dazzle the imagination, the former walks in open day- 
light, and is busied with the common and vulgar wants of men, expressed in common, 
every-day language. Warner is chargeable also with shocking grossness and inde- 
cency, and on this account, more than any other, has fallen into deserved neglect. 



Southwell. 

Robert Southwell, 1560-1595, one of the minor poets of 
the time of Elizabeth, is remembered with melancholy in- 
terest on account of his tragical end. 

Early Career. — Southwell was born of Catholic parents, who sent him, when 
very young, to be educated at the English college at Douay, and from thence to Rome, 
where, at the age of sixteen, he entered tlie Society of the .Tesuits. At tlic age of 
twenty-four he returned to his native country as a missionai-y, notwithstanding a 
law which threatened with death all members of his profession who slunild be found 
in England. For eight years he appears to have ministered secretly but zealously to 
the scattered adherents of his creed, without, however, so far as is known, doing any- 
thing to disturb the "peace of society. 



72 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

Arrest and Iniprisonnient. — In 1592, he was apprehended in a gentleman's 
house, and committed to a dungeon in the Tower, so noisome and filthy, that, when 
he was brought out for examination, his clothes were covered with vermin. Upon this 
his father, a man of good family, presented a petition to the Queen, to ths effect, that 
if his son had committed anything for which, by the laws, he had deserved death, let 
him suffer death ; if not, as he was a ge:itlemau, he hoped her Majesty would order 
him to be treated as a gentleman. Southwell, after this, was better lodged. 

Tibial and JEdcecution. — An imprisonment of three years, with ten inflictions 
of the rack, wore out his patience, and he entreated to be brought to trial. Cecil is 
said to have made the brutal remark, that '• if he was in so much haste to be hanged, 
he should quickly have his desire."' Being found guilty, on his own confession, of 
being a Romish priest, he was condemned to death, and executed at Tyburn, with all 
the revolting circumstances of cruelty characteristic of the old treason law of England. 
Througliout these scenes. Southwell is said to have behaved with a mild fortitude, 
wliicli was the strongest commentary on his purity of character. The life of South- 
well was short, but full of grief; and the prevailing tone of his poetry is that of re- 
ligious resignation. 

Sis Poetry. — Southwell's two longest poems, St. Peter's Complaint, and Mary 
Magdalene's Tears, were written in prison. Though composed while he was suffering 
cruel persecution, no trace of angry feeling occurs in them against any human being 
or institution. Southwell's poems were for a time exceedingly popular: after that, 
they fell for a long time into neglect. They have risen ag<ain in public estimation in 
the present day, a new and complete edition of them having appeared in 1856. 

Daniel. 

Samuel Daniel, 1562-1619, figured as a lyric poet, a 
dramatist, and a historian. 

Daniel was educated at Oxford, and became tutor to the Countess of 
Pembroke. He was associated in London with Shakespeare, Marlowe, 
Chapman, and others of that class, and towards the close of his life 
retired to a small farm in the country. He wrote many poems, and 
was in great favor among his contemporaries. 

Sis Works. — The following are the titles of some of his works : The Queen's Ar- 
cadia, a Pastoral Tragi-Comedy ; The Tragedy of Cleopatra; The Tragedy of Philotus; 
Hymen's Triumph ; Twelve Goddesses ; Musophilus : and numerous Sonnets. He wrote 
also, in prose, A History of England, and A History of the Civil Wars between the 
Houses of York and Lancaster. 

" His father was a master of music; and his harmonious mind made an impression 
on his son's genius, who passed as an exquisite poet. He carried, in his Christian 
[name] and surname, two holy prophets, his monitors, so to qualify his raptures, that 
he abhorred all profaneness. He was also a judicious historian, witness his Lives of 
our English Kings since the Cnnquest until Edward III., wherein he hath the happi- 
ness to reconcile brevity with clearness, qualities of great distance in other authors. 
In his old age, he turned husbandman, and rented a farm in 'Wiltshire. I can give no 
account how he thrived thereupon." — Fuller's Worthies. 



SPENSER AND CONTEMPORARY POETS. 73 

Drayton. 

Michael Drayton, 1563-1631, was a voluminous poet of 
much celebrity in his time, though now little read. 

Drayton was aided in early hfe by Sir Walter Acton, and in his later 
years he lived in comfort under the hospitable roof of the Earl of 
Dorset. 

Chief Worli. — Drajtou's chief work was the Poly-Olbion, in 30 Songs or Cantos, 
and making 30,U00 Alexandrian lines, i-liyniing in couplets. It is a topographical de- 
scription of all the tracts, rivers, mountains, and forests of Great Britain, intermixed 
with local traditions and antiquities. In other words, it is the antiquities of Britain, in 
verse. As a book of antiquities, it is said to be remarkable for its accuracy and for 
tlie minuteness of its information, and it is not devoid of poetry. 

Other Works. — Drayton wrote also, TJie Barons' Wars, an account of the civil wars 
of the reign of Edward II.; England's Heroical Epistles ; Tlie Shephei-d's Garland; The 
Court of Fairy ; The Moon Calf ; The Downfall of Robert of Normandy ; Holy Hymns, 
&c., Ac. The Barons' Wars and the Heroical Epistles were of great length. His 
poems altogether amount to more than 100,000 lines. 

"His Poly-Olbion is certainly a wonderful work, exhibiting at once the learning of 
an historian, an antiquary, a naturalist, and a geographer, and embellished by the 
imagination of a poet." — Ellis's Early English Foets. 

"There is probably no poem of this kind in any other language, comparable in ex- 
tent and excellence to the Poly-Olbion ; nor can any one read a portion of it without 
admiration for its learned and highly gifted author'." — Hallam. 

"The genius of Drayton is neither very imaginative nor very pathetic; but he is 
an agreeable and weighty writer, with an ardent, if not a highly creative fancy." — CraiJc. 
"Drayton, sweet ancient bard, his Albion sung, 
With their own praise her echoing valleys rung ; 
His bounding muse o'er every mountain rode. 
And every river warbled where he flowed." — J. Kirkpati-ich. 

Edward Fairfax, 1632, is well known as the 

translator of Tasso. 

Fairfax was a son of Sir Thomas Fairfax, of Yorkshire, and passed 
his time in lettered ease in a quiet country-seat. 

Woi'hs. — Resides the translation of Tasso's Jerusalem, Delivered, Fairfax wrote A 
Poetical History of the Black Prince ; Twelve Eclogues; A Discourse on Witchcraft. Ac. 
None of them are of any particular value except his Tasso, and this was so admirable 
that it has kept its place to this day as a standard work. 

"We do not know a translation in any language that is to be preferred to this in 
all the essentials of poetry." — London Quart. Review. 

Sir Thomas Overbury, 1581-1613, Avas a witty gallant of the reign 
of James I. He was imprisoned in the Tower on a frivolous pretext, 

7 



74 ENGLISH LITEEATURE. 

and was there poisoned through the machinations of the Earl of 

Somerset. 

Overljury wrote two didactic poems, The Wife, and The Choice of a Wife. His best 
work was in prose, consisting of a series of Characters, or Witty Descriptions of the 
Properties of fc^uudry Persijus. 

Wotton. 

Sir Henry Wotton, 15G8-1639, was a writer and a politi- 
cal character of some note in the reigns of Elizabeth and of 
James I. 

His Career. — Wotton was born at Bocton TTall, the seat of his ancestors, in Kent. 
After receiving his education at Winchester and Oxford, and travelling for some 
years on the Continent, he attached himself to the service of Essex, the favorite of 
Elizabeth, but had the sagacity to foresee the fate of that nobleman, and to elude its 
consequences by withdrawing in time from the kingdom. Having afterwards gained 
the friendship of James, by communicating the secret of a conspiracy formed j^gainst 
him, he was employed by tliat monarch, after his accession to the throne of England, 
as ambassador to Venice. He had a versatile and lively mind, well suited in some 
respects to the intricacies of foreign diplomacy. One of his sayings is often quoted. 
He defines an ambassador to be "an honest gentleman sent to lie abroad for the good 
of his country." In 1627, he was made Provost of Eton, whicli post he occupied until 
his death, in 1639. 

WorJcs. — While living abroad he embodied the result of his inquiries into politi- 
cal affairs in a work called The State of Christendovt, or, A Most Exact and Curious 
Discovery of Many Secret Passages and Hidden Mysteries of the Times. While I'ro- 
vost of Eton he jiublished Elements of Architecture^ the best work on tlie subject at 
that time. The Reliqidse Wottonianse. published posthumously, is a collection of liis 
miscellaneous pieces, including Lives, Letters, Poems, and Characters. 

"The poetry of Wotton, though chiefly written for tlie amusement of his leisure, 
and through the excitement of casual circumstances, possesses the invaluable attrac- 
tions of energy, simplicitj% and the most touching morality ; it comes warm from the 
heart, and, whether employed on an amatory or a didactic subject, makes its appropriate 
impression with an air of sincerity' which never fails to delight. Of this description 
are the pieces entitled J Fareivell to the Vanities of the World, the Character of a Happy 
Life, and the Lines on the Queen of Bohemia.'''' — Drake's Shakespeare. 

Barnabt Barnes, 15R9 , one of the hangers-on of the Earl of Essex, wrote a 

considerable number of sonnets, madrigals, odes, &c. His Sonnets were 100 in num- 
ber, and were called by liim A Divine Century of Spiritual Sonnets, 159.5. He pub- 
lished also Four Books of Offices, and Tlie Devil's Charter, a Tragedy. 

RiCHAED Barnfielb, 1574 , was the author of several poems : The Atfectionate 

Shepherd, 1594; Cynthia, 1595; The Encomium of Lady Pecunia, or Praise of Money, 
&c., 1598. 

Joshua Sylvester, 1563-1618, enjoyed in his day no little repu- 
tation as a poet and a linguist, and was even called the ''silver- 
tongued," 



SPENSER AND CONTEMPORARY POETS. 75 

Sylvester was the author of a number of sonnets and poems, in several of -which he 
vied with his royal master, James I., in the denunciation of tobacco. His chief fame, 
perhaps, rests upon liis translation of the works of the French poet Du Bartas. One 
of the poems by Du Bartas — La Semaine — may be said to contain the germs of Mil- 
ton's Paradise Lost. 

William Browne, 1590-1645, a writer of pastorals, was highly commended by Ben 
Joiison, Drayton, and Selden, and by critics of a later date; but his poems have failed 
to hold a permanent place in literature. Woi'ks : Britannia's Pastorals ; The Shep- 
herd's Pipe ; The Inner Temple, a Mas(iue, etc. 

Samuel Rowlands, 1634, Avas the author of many curious poetical pieces, which 

form a part of the literary history of the period. 

The followins are the titles of some of Rowland's poems : The Betraying of Christ; 
Judas in Despair; The Letting of Humor's Blood in the Head- Vein; 'Tis Merry when 
Gossips Meet; Look to it, for I'll stab Ye; Doctor Merryman, or Nothing but Mirth; 
The Knave of Clubs; The Knave of Hearts; More Knaves Yet; Good News and Bad 
News ; The Night Raven, etc. 

" Tlie humorous description of low life exhibited in Rowlands's Satires are more 
precious to antiquarians than more grave works, and those who make the manners of 
Shakespeare's age the subject of their study may better spare a better author than 
Samuel Rowlands." — Sir Walter Scott. 

Giles and Phineas Fletcher. 

Giles Fletcher, 1588-1623, and Phineas Fletcher, 1584- 
1650, brothers, 'were poets of a kindred stamp, and were 
much alike in their characters and pursuits. 

Both were educated at Eton and Cambridge ; both were clergymen ; 
both are in good estimation for poetry of a quiet, but pure and ele- 
vating character. 

They were cousins of John Fletcher, the Dramatist, the associate of 
Beaumont. 

Giles Fletcher's chief poem is entitled Christ's Victory and Ti-iumph in Heaven and 
Earth over and after Death. The desci'iption which he gives of the first meeting be- 
tween Christ and the Tempter is supposed to have suggested to Milton some of the 
scenes in his Paradise Regained. 

" Giles, inferior as he is to Spenser and Milton, might be figured, in his happiest 
moments, as a link of connection in our poetry between those congenial spirits, for 
he reminds us of both, and evidently gave hints to the latter in a poem on the same 
subject with Paradise Regained." — CumijhelVs English Poets. 

Phineas Fletcher, the elder brother, wrote several poems : The Locusts or ApoUyon- 
ists, a satire directed against the Jesuits; Sicelides, a Dramatic piece; Piscatory 
Fclogues, etc., and good old Izaak Walton calls him "An excellent divine aiui an 
excellent angler."' But his chief work, and the only one by which he is now known, 
was The Purple Island. This was an allegorical poem, after the style of Spenser, the 



76 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

"Island" being the human body, its streams being the veins and arteries, and the 
moral and mental faculties of the soul being the actors or heroes. 

" The title of the Purple Island is most attractive and most fallacious. If a reader 
should take it up (as would probably be the case with those ignorant of its nature) with 
the expectation of finding some delightful stoi-y or romantic fiction, what must be his 
disappointment to plunge at once into an anatomical lecture in verse on the human 
frame — to find that the poet had turned topographer of an island founded upon hu- 
man bones, with veins for its thousand small brooks, and arteries for its larger streams ; 
and that the mountains and valleys with which it is diversified are neither more nor 
less than the inequalities and undulations of the microcosm." — Retrospective Review. 

"After exerting his entire powers on this department of the subject, the virtues 
and better qualities of the heart, under their leader. Electa, or Intellect, are attacked 
by the vices; a battle ensues, and the latter are vanquished, after a vigorous opposi- 
tion, through the interposition of an angel, who appears at the prayer of Electa." — 
Headley. 

" They were both the disciples of Spenser, and, with his diction greatly modernized, 
retained much of his melody and luxuriant expression. Giles's Christ's Victory has 
a tone of enthusiasm peculiarly solemn. Phineas, with a livelier fancy, had a coarse 
taste. He lavished on a bad subject the power and ingenuity that would have made 
a fine poem on a good design." — CamphelVs English Poets. 

Herbert. 

George Herbert, 1593-1632, a thoughtful and quiet poet 
of this period, was the author of two poems, The Temple, 
and The Country Parson, which have given him a perma- 
nent place in literature. 

Herbert was a younger brother of Lord Edward Herbert. He was 
educated at Westminster School and at Cambridge, and took orders 
in the Church of England. In all particulars he seems to have been 
the direct opposite of his brother, leading the quiet, retired life of a 
country divine, and governed by a spirit of unaffected piety. 

Herbert is known by the two principal poetical works already named and by Izaak 
Walton's life of him. Herbert's simple, pure poetry, appearing in an age of unbounded 
licentiousness, met with astonishing success. Although later generations have mod- 
erated the lavish praise bestowed upon Herbert by his contemporaries, the final judg- 
ment seems strongly in favor of the poet's claims to lasting recognition. His poems 
are at times overloaded with conceits and quaint imagery — the great fault of that 
age — but this cannot destroy the vein of true, devotional poetry running through 
them all. 

Drummond of Hawthornden. 

William Drummond of Hawthornden, 1585-1649, a 
Scotchman, the son of Sir John Drummond, was a poet of 
good repute in his day. 



SPENSER AND CONTEMPORARY POETS. 77 

Dnimmond was educated at the University of Edinburgh, and afterwards studied 
the civil law in France, but abandoned tlie profession for that of letters. On the death 
of his father, he retired to tlie family seat of Hawthornden, famous for the beauty of 
its natural scenery, and there lived in peaceful seclusion, cultivating the muses. 
Ben Jonson visited him there. 

Drummond has the distinction of being the first Scottish poet that wrote in the 
pure English dialect. His poems are not numerous, but they are highly praised. 
Among them may be particularly noticed his Sonnets, The River of Forth Feasting; 
The Praise of a Solitary Life, etc. 

William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, 1580-1640, a Scotch poet, had some celebrity 
in his day, and was highly praised by the earlier critics. He was the author of a 
poem called Parsenesis; Aurora, which was a collection of sonnets, songs, and ele- 
gies; and four tragedies, Darius, Croesus, The Alexandrian Tragedy, and Julius Caesar. 
These are in rhyme, and are not suited for the stage. 



EXTRACT. 
The Image of Death. 
Before my face the picture hangs, 

That daily should put me in mind 
Of those cold names and bitter pangs 

That shortly I am like to find ; 
But yet, alas ! full little I 
Do think hereon, that I must die. 
I often look upon a face 

Most ugly, grisly, bare, and thin ; 
I often view the hollow place 

Where eyes and nose had sometimes been ; 
I see the bones across that lie. 
Yet little think that I must die, 
I read the label underneath, 

That telleth me whereto I must; 
I see the sentence too, that saith, 

" Eemember, man, thou art but dust." 
But yet, alas ! how seldom I 
Do think, indeed, that I must die ! 
Continually at my bed's head 

A hearse doth hang, which doth me tell 
That I ere morning may be dead, 

Though now I feel myself full well ; 
But yet, alas ! for all this, I 
Have little mind that I must die ! 
7* 



78 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

The gown which I am used to wear, 
The knife wherewith I cut my meat ; 

And eke that old and ancient chair, 
Which is my only usual seat ; 

All these do tell me I must die, 

And yet my life amend not I. 

My ancestors are turn'd to clay, 
And many of my mates are gone ; 

My youngers daily drop away, 
And can I think to 'scape alone? 

No, no ! I know that I must die. 

And yet my life amend not I. 



If none can 'scape Death's dreadful dart ; 

If rich and poor his beck obey ; 
If strong, if wise, if all do smart. 

Then I to 'scape shall have no way : 
Then grant me grace, O God ! that I 
My life may mend, since I must die. — Southwell. 




i 




CHAPTER VI. 



Shakespeare and the Early Dramatists. 



Rise of the English Drama. 

Miracle Plays. — At the dawn of modern civilization, most Euro- 
pean countries had a rude kind of theatrical entertainment, known as 
Miracle Plays, or Miracles. These plays were representations of the 
principal supernatural events of the Old and New Testaments, and of 
the lives of the saints, 

Cliaracter of the Miracle Tlnys. — The Miracle Plays did not undertake to 
exhibit natural characters and incidents, like the classic dramas of Greece and Rome, 
but to set forth Scriptural and religious transactions. In the absence of printing, 
they were one means of making known some of the contents of the Scriptures, and they 
■were thought to be favorable to the diffusion of religious feeling. They were under 
the management of the clergy, and were acted by men of the clerical order. They 
were generally acted in church, and often on Sunday. Traces of these Miracle Plays 
in England may be found as far back as the Norman Conquest, in the twelfth century; 
possibly a little earlier. 

Moral Plays. — The Miracle Plays were succeeded by a somewhat 
higher sort of drama, called Moral Plays, or Moralities. 

CJuiracter and, Bistory. — In the Moral Plays persons were introduced repre- 
senting abstract ideas and moral sentiments, such as Mercy, Justice, Truth, and so on. 
The only Scriptural character retained in them is the Devil, who is represented in 
grotesque habiliments, and who is perpetuallj' beat' n by an attendant character, 
called The Tice. The Moral Plays at first were acted by clei'gymen, or by school-boys, 
and sometimes by members of guilds and trading corporations. Acting had not yet 
become a distinct pi-ofession. The Moral Plays were introduced about the time of 
Henry VI., say the middle of the fifteenth century, and were continued into the 
reign of Henry A'lIT., or nearly to the middle of the sixteenth century. 

Interludes. — The next step in the development of the drama was a 
kind of plays called Interludes. 

79 



80 SHAKESPEARE 

Charncter and Histori/. — The Interhicles were a species of farce. They were 
introduced in the time of Henry VIII,, at which time also, acting began to be a dis- 
tinct profession. In the Interludes, allegorical characters and abstractions also began 
to give way to characters taken from real life. The principal, perhaps only, writer of 
Interludes was John Heywood, who w;is supported at the Court of Henry VIII., 
partly as a musician, partly as a professed wit, and partly for the purpose of writing 
these Interludes for the amusement of the Court. 

TJie Four JP's. — One of Heywood's Interludes, called The Four P's, turns upon 
a dispute between a Palmer, a Pardoner, a Poticary, and a Pedler, as to which shall 
tell the biggest lie. An accidental assertion of the Palmer, that he never in his life 
saw a woman out of patience, takes the others off their guard. They all declare it to 
be the biggest lie they ever heard, and so the question is settled. 

The Regular Drama. — The regular drama began in England near the 
close of the reign of Henry VIII., and about the middle of the six- 
teenth century. 

Character and History. — The regular dramas, though growing out of the the- 
atrical entertainments which had preceded, were formed after the old classical models, 
and also after those of Spain and Italy, all of which had now begun to be studied by 
dramatic writers in England. They were from the first divided into Comedies and 
Tragedies, and were in five acts. 

Halph Moyster Dnyster. — The play with this uncouth name was the first 
regular Comedy of which we have any record. It was written by Nicolas Udall, Mas- 
ter of Westminster School, about the year 15.51.. The scene is in London, and the 
characters, thirteen in number, represent the manners of the middle orders of the 
people of that day. 

Misogomts. — Another early comedy, called MIsogonus, was written about 1.560, 
by Thomas Richards. The scene is laid in Italy, but the manners are English. The 
character of the domestic Fool, which figures so largely in the old Comedy, appears 
for the first time in this play. 

Gammer Giirton's Needle. — This comedy was written about 1.565, by John 
Still, afterwards Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity, and Bishop of Bath and Wells. 
It is a piece of low rustic humor, tiirning upon the loss and recovery of the needle 
with which Gammer (godmother, or granny) Gurton was mending a garment belong- 
ing to her man Hodge. 

Ferrex and Porrex, — This is the name of the earliest known Tragedy in Eng- 
lish. It was written by Thonins Sackville, afterwards Earl of Dorset, and was played 
before Queen Elizabeth at Whitehall, by members of the Inner Temple, in 1561. It 
is founded on early British story, and is full of blood and civil broils. 

J)amon and Pythias. — This is the first English tragedy founded on a classical 
subject. It was acted before Queen Elizabeth, at Oxford, in 1566. 

Rapid Growth of the Drama. — From the time of the regular plays 
just named, the drama may be considered as one of the established 
forms of English literature. Once established, its growth was rapid. 
Before the close of Elizabeth's reign it had attained a height and 
splendor which threw into the shade all other kinds of literary work. 



AND THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 81 

Even the Fairy Queen paled before the rising sun of the new Eliza- 
bethan Drama. 

Immediate Predecessors of Shakespeare. — Shakespeare, the greatest of 
English dramatists, rose from tliese humble beginnings at once into meridian splen- 
dor. Some few stars, however, are discernible in the early dawn preceding Shake- 
speare's rise. These will now be briefly noticed. 

KiCHARD Edwaeds, 1523-1566, was a dramatic writer of some 
note in the early part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. 

Edwards was the author of Damon and Pythias, already mentioned, and chief con- 
tributor to the Paradise of Dainty Devices. He wrote also The Comedy of Palamon 
and Arcite, and other pieces, dramatic and lyric. " He united all those arts and ac- 
complishments which minister to popular pleasantry: he was the first fiddler, the 
most fashionable sonnetteer, the readiest rhymer, and the most facetious mimic of 
the Court." — Warton. 

George Gascoigne, 1537-1577, was a dramatic writer and a cour- 
tier in the days of Queen Elizabeth. 

Gascoigne contriboted to the entertainment of the Court by writing Masques. 
Some of his pieces are said to have been the first specimens of regular Comedy in 
English prose. His principal pieces are : The Princely Pleasures of Kenil worth Castle, 
a Masque ; The Comedy of Supposes, altered from the Spanish ; The Tragedy of Jocasta, 
altered from the Greek. 

John Lyey, 1553-1600, a dramatic writer of some note, was the 
author of nine plays, written mostly for Court entertainments, and per- 
formed by the scholars of St. Paul's. 

Lyly was an Oxford scholar, and many of his plays are on mythological subjects, as 
Sappho, Endymion, etc. His style is affected and unnatural ; and, like his own Niobe, 
"oftentimes he had sweet thoughts, sometimes hard conceits; betwixt both, a kind 
of yielding." 

jAfly's JEuphties. — OxiQ of Lyly's works, Euphues, or The Anatomy of Wit, ex- 
ercised a most mischievous influence upon the literature of the day, causing that 
general use of euphuistie expressions which marks most of the writings of his con- 
temporaries and immediate successors. Lyly is supposed to have been meant by 
Shakespeare in his character of Don Adriano de Armado, in Love's Labor's Lost, " a 
man of fire new words, fashion's own knight — that hath a mint of phrases in his 
brain — one whom the music of his own tongue doth ravish like enchanting har- 
mony." Sir Walter Srott, in The Monastery, has drawn an amusing caricature of one 
of these euphuists in Sir Piercie Shafton. 

Lyly's forte was in lyrical composition, and some of his short pieces show that he 
was a man of real genius. 

Thomas ^^ash, 1558-1600, a native of Suffolk, and a scholar of Cam- 
bridge. He was a lively satirist, — the Churchill of his day. 

F 



82 SHAKESPEARE 

Nash amused the town with his attacks on Gabriel Harvey and the Puritans. He 
wrote a comedy called Summer's Last Will and Testament, which was acted before 
Queen Elizabeth, in 1597. He was concerned with Marlowe in writing the Tragedy of 
Dido Queen of Carthage. He was imprisoned lor being the author of a satirical lilay, 
never printed, called the Isle of Dogs. Two of his other pieces are The Supplication 
of Pierce Peniuless to the Devil, and Chrisfs Tears over Jerusalem. Nash's versifica- 
tion is hard and monotonous, but his thoughts are often striking. 

Robert Greene, 1560-1592, was one of the minor 
dramatists contemporary -with Siiakespeare. 

Greene -was educated at Cambridge, and took orders in the Church, 
but lost his preferment, probably on account of the irregularities of his 
life. 

" He was a boon companion with the dissipated wits of the day, deserted a lovely wife, 
lived a profligate life, chequered with parti;il repentance, and died of a surfeit of 
pickled herrings and llhenish wine." — Allibone. 

Inlays. — Greene's Plays are : The History of Orlando ; Friar Bacon and Friar Bun- 
gay : Alphonsus, King of Arragon ; James IV. ; George Greene, the Pinner of Wake- 
field ; The Looking Glass for London and England. 

Other Works. — Besides his plays, Greene wrote a large number of tales and 
other prose pieces, some licentious and indecent, others full of repentance for his own 
misdeeds and serious exhortations to his fellows to "avoid his example. 

Character. — Greene was not devoid of literary ability, and his writings made no 
little impression upon the men and women of that age. His style is strongly tinc- 
tured with the euphuisms with which Lyly had infected his generation. 

Groat's Worth of Wit. — One of Greene's tracts, A Groat's Worth of Wit Bought 
with a Million of Repentance, is often quoted for the light which it throws upon con- 
temporary literature. It contains, among other things, the following allusion to 
Siiakespeare, showing that Shakespeare had even then, 1.592, become an object of envy 
to less successful aspirants : " There is an upstart crow beautified with our feathers, 
that, with his tiger's heart wrapt in a player's hide, [a parody on Shakespeare's line, 
in Henry VI., Part Third, ' tiger's heart wrapt in a wommi's hide,'] supposes he is as 
well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you; and being an absolute Jo- 
hannes Fac-totum, is, in his own conceit, the only Shake-scene in a country." The 
conclusion of this pamphlet gives a melancholy picture of a man of genius dying 
prematurely from the effects of a disorderly and vicious life: 

"But now return I again to you three [Marlowe, Lodge, and Peele], knowing my 
misery is to you no new^s : and let me heartily intreat you to be warned by my 
harms. Delight not, as I have done, in irreligious oaths, despise drunkenness, fly 
lust, abhor those epicures whose loose life hath made religion loathsome to your 
ears ; and when they soothe you with terms of mastership, remember, Robert Greene 
(whom they have often flattered) perishes for want of comfort. Remember, gentle- 
men, your lives are like so many light-tapers, that are with care delivered to all of 
you to maintain; these, with wiiie-puffed breath, may be extinguished, with drunken- 
ness put out, with negligence let fall. The fire of my light is now at the last snuff. 
My hand is tired, and I [am] forced to leave where I would begin ; desirous that you 
should live, though himself be dying." 



AND THE EAELY DRAMATISTS. 83 



Marlowe. 

Christopher Marlowe, 1562-1593, was the greatest of the 
precursors of Shakespeare. 

Marlowe was the son of a shoemaker in Canterbury. He received, 
however, a learned education, and was graduated at Cambridge. 

Marlowe's first play, Tamburlaine the Great, was written before his 
graduation. It was the first English play in blank verse, and the ver- 
sification has a peculiar majestic swell and sonorousness, which, though 
verging upon bombast, yet suggested and justified Ben Jonson's phrase 
of " Marlowe's mighty line." 

Marlowe's second play. The Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, ex- 
hibits a far wider and higher range of dramatic power than his first 
tragedy. The subject is the same as that of Goethe's most celebrated 
work, and many of the characters, Faust, Mephistopheles, Wagner, etc., 
appear in both works. 

Marlowe's other plays are : The Jew of Malta, The Massacre at Paris, and Edward 
the Second. The play last named is one of his best, and is the first example of the 
historical play. Marlowe wrote some beautiful lyrics, and is supposed to have had a 
part in the authorship of several other plays. 

Marlowe lived an irregular life, and died young, being killed in a miserable brawl. 
He was a man of uncommon genius, and was undoubtedly the greatest English dra- 
matic writer before Shakespeare, 

Thomas Lodge, 1566-1625, educated at Oxford, was a prominent 
actor, dramatist, and poet of his day. 

Lodge's principal dramas are : The Wounds of Civil War, and Rosa- 
lynde, from which latter Shakespeare borrowed the incidents of As 
You Like It. Lodge was also the translator of Seneca and Josephus, 
and the author of several pretty pastoral songs. 

"Lodge and Greene are the only imitators of Lyly who have atoned for affectation 
of style by any felicity of genius or invention." — Dunlop's History of Fiction, 

George Peeee, 1553-1598, after completing his studies at Oxford, 
came to London and became a writer and actor of plays, and a share- 
holder with Shakespeare and others in the Blackfriars Theatre. 

Peele also held the situation of city poet and conductor of pageants for the Court. 
He has considerable poetical fancy, and his versification is smooth and musical. But 
his blank verse witnts the variety of pauses and modulation given to it by Shakespeare. 
His life, like that of most of his fellow actors and dramatists of that day, is involved 
in obscurity, the dates both of his birth and death being matter of conjecture. 

Worhs. — Peele wrote The Arraignment of Paris, a court show, exhibited before 



84 SHAKESPEARE 

Queen Elizabeth ; Edward the First, an historical plaj' ; The Old Wives' Tale, acted by 

"the Queen's JJajesty's Players :" The Tragedy of Absalom ; Tlie Love of King David 
and Fair Eethsaba: The Battle of Alcazar, &c. His Scriptural drama of David and 
Bethsaba is considered his best. His Works have been edited in 3 vols. 8vo., with a 
Life, by Alexander Dyce. 



Henry Chettlr, was a dramatist contemporary with Shakespeare, and is chiefly 
known for his attempt to disparage the latter. He wrote a very large number, of plays, 
few of which have come down to us. 



Thomas Kyd was another of the immediate predecessors of Shake- 
speare. 

Kyd was the author of three plays, Cornelia, The First Part of Jeronimo, and The 
Spanish Tragedy, or Hieronimo is Mad Again. This last seems to have been popu- 
lar in its day, as it appeared in several editions, two of which were enlarged by Ben 
Jonson. It was much ridiculed by Shakespeare. 



Robert Armyn, one of the company of actors connected with Shakespeare, was the 
author of several pieces of some note : Nest of Ninnies, 1608 ; Italian Taylor and his 
Boy, 1609; and perhaps The Taliant Welshman, 1615. 



Shakespeare. 

William Shakespeare, 1564-1616, is, by the common con- 
sent of mankind, the greatest dramatist, and in the opinion 
of a large and growing number of critics, the greatest writer, 
that the world has ever produced. His writings created an 
era in literature, and constitute of themselves a special and 
most important study. 

Note. — It would not be possible, in a general course of literature, 
such as the present, to attempt anything like a complete expression of 
Shakespeare's character and genius. Such an attempt is the less neces- 
sary, as special essays on the subject are abundant, and accessible to 
every reader. All that is deemed necessary', therefore, is to give a 
brief outline of what he was, and what he has done. 

His Life, — Our knowledge of the life of Shakespeare is very imper- 
fect, consisting of meagre and unsatisfactory outlines. Of his habits of 
life, his method of composition, we know absolutely nothing. Unlike 
Goethe, Dante, Moliere, and Cervantes, Shakespeare has left no record 
of himself whereby we may watch his intellectual development. All 
that we can say of him, on acceptable external evidence, is that he 
came of a good family in Stratford-upon-Avon, that his father was a 



AXD THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 85 

butclier or a glover, and that his mother, Marv Arden, was slightly 
connected with the gentry. The poet received a school or academy 
education, and probably nothing more. In 1586, or 1587, he removed 
to London, being probably thrown upon his own resources by his 
father's failure in business. He had previously married Anne Hatha- 
way, a woman several years his senior. She seems to have played ab- 
solutely no part in determining the poet's life and genius. After 
establishing himself in London — some have supposed as a lawyer's 
clerk — he took up play-writing and acting as a profession, soon gained 
an interest in the Blackfriars Theatre, acquired the friendship and 
patronage of the Earl of Southampton, and retired to Stratford a 
wealthy man, for the last few years of his life. Such is the substance 
of all that we know about the life of England's greatest poet. 

Date of Ms Works. — There is some dispute as to which of his plays 
first appeared, and when it appeared. Probably it was the second part 
of Henry VI., about 1592. The last was The Tempest, in 1611. Be- 
sides his plays, we have his Sonnets, his Venus and Adonfs, Kape of 
Lucrece, The Lover's Complaint, and Passionate Pilgrim. The Son- 
nets appeared in 1609, the others about ten years before. The dates 
of all his dramas are more or less uncertain ; equally uncertain is the 
authorship of Titus Andronicus and of Pericles. The better opinion 
seems to be that they were only touched uj) in passages by Shakespeare. 
The other doubtful plays, such as Sir John Oldcastle, Locrine, A York- 
shire Tragedy, &c., are now generally rejected. Excluding Titus An- 
dronicus and Pericles, then, we have left thirty-five plays, divided 
into Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories. 

Editions and Translations. — The first collective edition of the 
plays appeared in 1623, and generally passes by the name of the " folio 
of 1623." 7'he countless subsequent editions are based upon this folio. 
During the dramatist's life many* spurious editions of separate plays 
appeared. As there was no copyright law at that time, the author's 
only way of protecting himself was to retain his works in manuscript. 
These surreptitious editions of the plays are supposed to have been 
made chiefly from hearing and seeing them acted. 

Shakespeare's dramas have been translated, wholly or in part, into 
every language of Europe, and into Bengalee, Hindostanee, and 
many other Asiatic tongues. 

Commentary and Criticism. — The volumes of commentary and criti- 
cism that have been heaped upon the poet constitute of themselves a 
large and ever-growing librarv, The scholars and critics of the last 
8 



86 SHAKESPEARE 

three centuries, in every land and tongue of Europe, have exercised 
tlieir wits in the real or supposed elucidation of the great master. Yet, 
after all, the English dramatist remains almost as grave a mystery as 
the Greek Homer, and, like Homer, he is his own best commentator. 
The obvious defect in all Shakespeare-criticism is that it is more or 
less one-sided. Each reviewer sees and grasps only so much as his 
own mind will let him, whereas the original, to use Coleridge's well- 
known epithet, is myriad-minded. 

Method of Study Eecomm ended. — The best, perhaps the only good 
method for the beginner to approach Shakespeare, is to discard rigor- 
ously all notes, essays, and commentaries, and, taking a handy edition 
in legible type, to read through play after play as rapidly as possible. 
It will be well for him, if circumstances and his temperament will per- 
mit him, to finish the thirty -five plays in as many consecutive secular 
days. Of course, in following such a plan, he will overlook many of 
the subtler beauties in thought and diction and many real difiiculties. 
But he will be more than compensated by gaining a general idea of the 
poet's wonderful versatility and range of thought, such as can be ob- 
tained in no other Avay. A literary excursion of this kind will resem- 
ble a trip across the American continent by rail in seven days. The 
traveller sees nothing very near at hand, and remembers nothing very 
distinctly. But he gains an impression, vague but ineffaceable, of 
magnitude and diversity. The majority of Shakespeare-readers labor 
under this difficulty, that they know the poet only in part. They 
judge him by a few of his leading plays, such as Hamlet, Othello, The 
Tempest, or The Merchant of Yenice, and know of King John, Eich- 
ard II., and the Henrys, only by reputation or by stock quotations. 

Study of Particular Plays, — After the reader has familiarized him- 
self with Shakespeare in outline, he can then take up single plays and 
subject them to minute analysis. The historical plays should be read 
in chronological order, for, although not written in that order, the sub- 
jects grow naturally one out of the other. Hamlet is undoubtedly 
Shakespeare's masterpiece, Othello is his most finished piece, and 
Twelfth Night or As You Like It is the most genial. But the two 
parts of Henry IV. and the play of Henry Y. form a trilogy that re- 
veals the poet in his greatest vigor and flexibility. 

Autobiograpliical Character. — We have no external evidence what- 
ever as to the principles which guided Shakespeare in the composi- 
tion of his plays. But the three last named suggest at least very 
strongly that Prince Hal comes nearer to the poet's beau-ideal than 



AND THE EAELY DRAMATISTS. 87 

any other of his creations, and that the body of non-historical incident 
is derived from his own life-experience. Yet in these, as in all the 
other plays, Shakespeare sinks himself completely in his creations. We 
cannot point to any one character or to any one action and say. That 
is Shakespeare. While reading these plays we never think of the 
artist. It is only when we reflect upon them that we are seized with 
the yearning to know more about their wonderful author. 

The Three Great Masters. — There are three men in the annals of 
.poetry who may be said to have created, or rather fixed, not merely the 
literature but also the language of their several countries. These three 
are Homer, Dante, and Shakespeare, and of the three the last is not the 
least. The epic unity of Homer was subsequently broken up into dia- 
lectic variations; much of Dante has become obsolete; but the forms 
and expressions of Shakespeare remain in almost perfect integrity. The 
language of the dramatist has passed so thoroughly into the minds and 
mouths of his countrymen that the latter constantly forget whence they 
obtained it. One of the chief pleasures in reading Shakespeare is the 
incessant stumbling upon phrases and sayings that everybody uses, 
such as *' food for gunpowder," " cudgeling one's wits," " the wish was 
father to tlie thought," etc. 

His Plots. — The plot of the Shakespearian drama is by no means 
perfect, and the unravelling is at times wholly conventional. No un- 
prejudiced mind can study Measure for Measure, for instance, and 
claim that the ending is in accordance with the merits of the charac- 
ters. Almost as much may be said of As You Like It and The Mer- 
chant of Venice. Again, the action is not always justified. Thus, in 
Romeo and Juliet, we are not informed why the heroine is obliged to 
resort to the artifice of a sham death instead of simply escaping from 
the city. 

Characterization. — Whatever faults an eager criticism may detect 
in these plays, the characters themselves will ever remain as embodi- 
ments of the most wonderful poetic imagination. What a flood of 
association rises at the mere mention of such names as Hamlet, 
Othello, Prince Hal, Hotspur, Falstafl", Bottom, Titania, Oberon, Ariel, 
Miranda, Imogen, Eosalind, Portia ! what a glamour of fancy in The 
Midsummer's Night's Dream! what a depth of woe in Hamlet or 
OthoUo ! 

His Style. — In the background of all lies the poet's wonderful style, 
liis way of looking at things and expressing himself. There is no other 
Rtvle that in the least resembles it. Its peculiarity does not consist so 



88 SHAKESPEAEE 

muck in an exact use or arrangement of words — although, no writer 
ever used or arranged words more scrupulously — as in a peculiarly 
Shakespearian turn of phrase and thought. Thus hundreds of writers 
before and after Shakespeare have expressed, in as many different ways, 
the general idea that kings, as makers of laws, are exempt from a too 
scrui)ulous observance of them ; but it may well be doubted whether 
any other than Shakespeare would ever have thought of saying that 
"nice customs curt'sy to great kings." The more we ponder this 
simple phrase, the more we will realize its wonderful expressiveness, 
which no amount of rhetorical analysis can. folly accomit for. There 
are thousands upon thousands of such passages scattered through these 
dramas with lavish hand. 

Minor Poems. — The minor poems of Shakespeare are the work of 
his immaturity, and therefore cannot fairly be compared with the plays. 
They are the beautiful products of a fiery but as yet untrained imagi- 
nation, and their peculiarly erotic character unfits them for general 
reading. The Sonnets are spoiled, for our complete enjoyment, at 
least, by the atmosphere of mystery that hangs over them. A sonnet 
is a peculiarly personal poem, and unless we know, not only by whom, 
but for whom, and under what circumstances, it was written, we cannot 
fairly appreciate it. The Shakespearian sonnets are wonderful in their 
imagery and their general conception. But their origin is involved in 
obscurity, and the allusions of many of them are inexplicable. It may 
be said of them, as a whole, that they are rather perplexing than satis- 
factory. There are single sonnets, however, which may be read with 
the greatest pleasure, and which fill the mind with a feeling of mingled 
wonder and awe, like that inspired by the greatest of the dramas. 

Ben Jonson. 

Ben Jonson, 1573-1637, was one of the greatest of the 
English dramatists, second to Shakespeare only, of whom he 
was a contemj)orarj and a rival. 

Early Life. — .Jonson was the son of a Protestant clergyman, who 
died a month before Ben was born. The ciu'rent tradition is that the 
mother was married again, the stepfather being a bricklayer, and Ben 
himself is said to have worked in making or laying brick. The story, 
however, is of doubtful authority. He was for a time a pupil of the 
famous Camden, at the Westminster school, and entered the Univer- 
sity, though his stay there was less than a month. He turned soldier, 



AXD THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 89 

and gained distinction in the army in the wars in the Low Coini- 
tries. 

Dramatic Career. — At the age of nineteen, or thereabouts, Jonson 
entered fully upon tlie dramatic career, first as an actor, then as an 
assistant to other dramatists in the composition of plays, and finally as 
an origmal di-amatLst. In the early f>art of his dramatic career, he had 
a quarrel with a fellow-actor, Gabriel Spencer, and a duel ensued in 
which Spencer was killed. Jonson was imprisoned two years for his 
crime. He was famoas indeed for his quarrels, and was seldom out of 
hot water. 

First Work. — .Jonson's first original di'ama of note was the comedy 
of Every Man in His Humor. Tliis was brought out some time be- 
tween 1596 and 159S, when the author was from 23 to 25 years old. It 
gave him at once fame and money, and the hatred of his rivals. 

Editions of his Works. — In 1616, Jonson published a collective 
edition in folio of nearly all his works to that time. He had made 
preparations before his death to give a revised edition of the works 
written after 1616, but death coming upon him suddenly, he failed to 
carry out the intention. There were frequent reprints after his death, 
but no scholarly and complete edition of his works was made until that 
put forth by Gifibrd, m 1616, in 9 vols. Svo. 

Frincipal JPlays. — The following are the titles of his principal Plays: Every 
Man in His Humor ; Every Man out of His Humor ; Cynthia's Revels ; The Poetaster ; 
Volpone, or The Fox ; Epiccene, or the Silent Woman ; The Alchemist ; Sejanus, His 
Fall, a Tragedy ; Cataline, His Conspiracy, a Tragedy ; and a large number of come- 
dies, masques, and dramatic pieces of different kinds. 

Peculiarities as an Author. — Jonson was accurately versed in the 
Greek and Latin classics, and insisted strongly on giving to the English 
drama the classic forms, and he was disposed to be intolerant and con- 
temptuous of those writers who either were ignorant of Greek and 
Latin, or who for any reason disregarded the classic rules. He was a 
man of genius and wit, as well as scholarship, and he had among his 
contemporaries the familiar name of Eare Ben Jonson. The two 
tragedies which he wrote have high merit, but his Comedies are re- 
garded as his best works. He received from King .James a pension 
of one hundred marks a year for life. 

Tavern Life. — A part of the literary history of that day was the 
social festivities kept up by the dramati.^ts at the taverns near the the- 
atres. The Mermaid and The Apollo were famous places of resort of 
tliL-* kind. Among those who met in the keen encounter of wit were 

8*- 



90 SHAKESPEARE 

Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont, Fletcher, Marlowe, and others 
equally known to fame. Good old Thomas Fuller thus speaks of Shake- 
speare and Jonson in these merry-meetings : 

" Many were the wit-combats betwixt him [Shakespeare] and Ben Jonson ; which 
two I beheld, like a Spanish great galleon and an English man-of-war. Master Jon- 
son (like the former) was built far higher in learning ; solid, but slow in his perform- 
ances. Shakespeare, with the English man-of-war, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sail- 
ing, could turn with all tides, tack about, and take advantage of all winds, by the 
quickness of his wit and invention." — Fuller. 

" Ben Jonson, a younger contemporary and rival of Shakespeare, who labored in 
the sweat of his brow, but with no great success, to expel the romantic drama from 
the English stage and to form it on the model of the ancients, gave it as his opinion 
that Shakespeare did not blot enough, and that, as he did not possess much school- 
learning, he owed more to nature than to art. Jonson was a critical poet in the good 
and bad sense of the word. He endeavored to form an exact estimate of what he had 
on every occasion to perform : hence he succeeded best in that species of the drama 
which makes the principal demand on the understanding and with little call on the 
imagination and feeling — the comedy of character. He introduced nothing into his 
works which critical dissection should not be able to extract again, as his confidence 
in it was such, that he conceived it exhausted every thing which pleases and charms 
us in poeti-y. • He was not aware that, in the chemical retort of the critic, what is most 
valuable, the volatile, living spirit of a poem, evaporates. His pieces are in general 
deficient in soul, in that nameless something which never ceases to attract and en- 
chant us even because it is indefinable. In the lyrical pieces, his masques, we feel 
the want of a certain mental music of imagery and intonation, which the most accu- 
rate observation of difficult measures cannot give. He is everywhere deficient in those 
excellencies which, unsought, flow from the poefs pen, and which no artist who pur- 
posely hunts for them can ever hope to find. We must not quarrel with iiim. however, 
for entertaining a high opinion of his own works, since whatever merits they have he 
owed, like acquired properties, altogether to himself. The production of them was 
attended with labor, and unfortunately it is also a labor to read them. They resemble 
solid and i-egular edifices, before which, however, the clumsy scaffolding still remains, 
to interrupt and prevent us from viewing the architectui'e with ease and receiving 
from it harmonious impressions. We have of Jonson two tragical attempts, and a 
number of comedies and masques. 

" He could have risen to the dignity of the ti-agic tone: but for the pathetic he had 
not the smallest turn ; so he incessantly preaches up the imitation of the ancients, (and 
he had, we cannot deny, a learned acquaintance with their works.) It is astonishing 
to observe how much his two tragedies differ, both in substance and form, from the 
Greek tragedy. After these attempts, Jonson took leave of the Tragic Muse, and in 
reality his talents were far better suited to Comedy, and that, too, merely the Comedy 
of Character. His characterization, however, is more marked with serious satire than 
playful ridicule ; the latter Roman satirists, rather than the comic authors, were his 
models. In so far as plot is concerned, the greatest praise is merited by Yolpone, The 
Alchemist, and Epiccene, or the Silent Woman." — A. W. Schlegel. 

Beaumont and Fletcher. 

These two names have to be taken as indicating one 
poet rather than two, so intimate was their literary part- 



AND THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 91 

nership. A few facts, however, may be stated separately 
of each. 

Francis Beaumont, 1585-1615, though the younger of the two, 
began his Uterary career before Fletcher, publishing a translation from 
Ovid, and writing the Masque of The Inner Temple and Gray's Inn, 
and minor Poems. He died young, at the age of thirty. 

John Fletcher, 1576-1625, though ten years older than his part- 
ner, was later in beginning authorship, and also survived him ten 
years. After the death of Beaumont, Fletcher brought out fourteen or 
fifteen plays, which are exclusively his own, except that in one of them 
he is said to have had assistance from Bowley. He wrote no undra- 
matic pieces of any note. 

Their Partnership. — The literary partnership of Beaumont and 
Fletcher is one of the most curious things in literary history. Of 
good birth and high connections, and classically educated, at the ages 
respectively of twenty ^.nd thirty, in the year 1606, when the genius 
of Shakespeare was in its meridian splendor, and under the influence 
of its bewitching spell, these two young men, of kindred genius, were 
drawn together as joint laborers for ten consecutive years, during which 
they produced no less than thirty-seven or thirty-eight plays, which 
bear their joint name. 

Their Rank and Character. — The dramas of Beaumont and Fletcher 
stand higher than those even of Ben Jonson, and, of all the dramatic 
writings of that day, come nearest to the magic circle which encloses 
Shakespeare. Their wonderful knowledge of stage effect doubtless 
helped their popularity. They catered also, to some extent, to the low 
taste of the age, by introducing licentious scenes and expressions which 
exclude their plays both from the stage and from the domestic circle 
at the present day. At the same time, they abound in striking beau- 
ties, both of thought and language, and the general tone of their works 
is of an elevating character. 

" Beaumont and Fletchei- want altogether that white, heat of passion by which Shake- 
speare forces all things into life and poetry at a touch, often making a single biief 
utterance flash upon us a full though momentary view of a character which all that 
folloM's deepens and fixes, and makes the more like to actual seeing with the eyes and 
hearing with the ears. His was a deeper, higher, in every way more extended and 
capacious nature than theirs. They want his profound meditative philosophy as much 
as they do his living poetry. Neither have they avoided, nearly to the same degree 
that he has done, the degradation of their fine gold by the intermixture of baser 
metal." — Craik. 



92 



SHAKESPEARE 



George Chapman, 1557-1634, is chiefly known as being 
the first English translator of Homer. 

Chapman wrote very copiously also for the stage, and he enjoyed 
the friendship of the great dramatists of the day, Shakespeare and Jon- 
son, as also that of Spenser. His plays have pretty nearly passed into 
oblivion. 

Chapman's Homer still survives, and is even now m good repute, and 
is preferred by many to that of Pope. He translated the whole of the 
Iliad and the Odyssey, and likewise the Works and Days of Hesiod. 
His translation is in the fourteen-sy liable rhyming couplet, and though 
having m places marks of negligence, is yet wonderful for the extent 
to which it preserves the fire and freedom of the original. It is 
counted as a beauty also that he has so successfully imitated the com- 
pound epithets of the Homeric verse, such as silver-footed, high-walled, 
fair-haired, strong-winged, music-footed, etc. 

In his private character. Chapman is highly spoken of; he died at 
the ripe age of seventy-seven, his whole life having been a scene of con- 
tent and prosperity. 

Thomas Middleton, 1626, is a dramatic poet of the 

times of Shakespeare and Ben Jonson. 

Works. — Middleton's pieces, numbering about twenty, extend from 
1602 to 1626. A complete critical edition of them has been edited by 
Alexander Dyce, in 5 vols. 8vo. 

Ilistory. — Little is known of Middleton's personal history. In his Game at Chess, 
he brought the King of Spain and his ambassador, Gondoniar, on the stage, -which 
cansed a complaint and led to the plaj'ers' being reprimanded before the Privj- Coun- 
cil. In 1620, Middleton was made Chronologer, or city poet, of London, an office held 
afterwards by Ben Jonson. 

HanJc, as a Drnmatist. — '^liMleton holds a respectable rank in the second class 
of dramatists of this period. One of his plays, The Witch, contains such strong resem- 
blances to the witch scenes in Macbeth, that it was until lately supposed that Shake- 
speare got some of his ideas from Middleton. But the results of the latest investiga- 
tions point the other way. Some of his other most noted pieces are : Women Beware 
Women, A Trick to Catch the Old One, A Mad World My Masters, &c. 



John Marston, 



1634, was a dramatic writer and 



satirist, who flourished from 1600 to 1634. 

INIarston wrote The Malcontent, Antonio and Mellida, The Insatiate 
Countess, What You Will, and other plays. He published also two 
volumes of miscellaneous poetry, translations, satires, &c. 



AND THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 93 

One of Marston's pieces was ordered to lie burned for its licentiousness. He was a 
rough, vigorous satirist, but was incapable of sympathy with any soft or gentle 
emotion. 

Thomas Decker, 1638, was a dramatist contempo- 
rary with Shakespeare, and associated with the other dra- 
matic writers of that age. 

Decker wrote twenty-eight plays, and a large number of tracts. His 
best known play is Fortunatus, or The Wishing Cap. His tract, The 
Gull's Horn Book, contams a curious picture of the manners and habits 
of the middle class in those days. 

Quarrel with Jonson. —Decker supposed himself to be meant by the character 
of Crispinus, in Ben Jonson's play "The Poetaster," and took his revenge in the play 
of Satiro-Mastix, where Ben figures as Horace Junior. Jonson's supposed allusions 
to Decker's ill-favored visage are thus paid back by the latter: "You staring Levia- 
than! look on the sweet visage of Horace : look, parboiled face : look — he has not his 
face puncht full of eyelet-holes, like the cover of a warming-pau ! " 

John Webster w^as a dramatist of celebrity contemporary 
with and succeeding Shakespeare, and associated with 
Decker, Kowley, and others. 

Almost nothing is known concerning the particulars of the life of 
Webster. He is mentioned by Gerald Langbaine as having lived in 
the reign of James I., and also by Henslowe, in his Diary. 

Works. — Webster wrote, in company with Thomas Decker, the plays 
The Famous History of Sir Thomas Wyat, Northward Ho, and 
W^estward Ho ; and, in company with Eowley, The Thracian Wonder. 
He also wrote, alone, The Devil's Lawcase, or When Women go to Law 
the Devil is full of Business, and Appius and Virginia, or The Koman 
Virgin, besides two minor poems. But his most famous plays are : The 
White Devil, or The Tragedy of Paulo Giordana Ursini and Vittoria 
Colombano, and The Tragedy of the Duchess of Malfy. 

Rank. — AVebster is among the first, if not the very first, in the gen- 
eration of dramatists succeeding Shakespeare. Indeed, the only fault 
that tl?,zlitt can find with Webster is that he imitates his great master 
too closely in style and conception. 

Character as a Writer. — Webster belongs to the class of dramatists 
who aim at harrowing the feelings of the reader or spectator. The 
characters are sharply drawn, the action is vigorous, and the language 
is well adapted to delivery, but the subjects are in themselves so 
painful that it may be doubted whether Webster will ever again be a 



94 SHAKESPEARE 

favorite except among the scliolarly few. His dramas were first col- 
lected by Dyce, and have since been re-edited by Hazlitt. 

" Webster was formed upon Shakespejire. He had no pretensions to the inexhausti- 
ble wit, the all-penetrating- humor, of his master; but he had the power of approach- 
ing the terrible energy of his passion, and the profoundness of his pathos, in characters 
wbich he took out of the great muster-roll of humanity and placed in fearful situa- 
tions, and sometimes with revolting imaginations almost beyond humanity 

It is clear what dramatic writers were the objects of Webster's love He 

belonged to the school of the romantic dramatists." — Charles Knight. 

Philip Massinger, 1584-1640, was a tragic poet of no 
little genius. 

Massinger's life was spent in obscurity and poverty. Dying almost 
unknown, he was buried with no other inscription than the melancholy 
note in the parish register, " Philip Massinger, a stranger^ 

Massinger entered Oxford in 1602, but left in 1604 without a degree, 
and began writing for the stage. He wrote a great number of pieces, 
of which eighteen only have been preserved. He was found dead in 
his bed at his house, Bankside, Southwark, one morning in March, 1640. 
The Virgin Martyr, the Bondman, the Fatal Dowry, the City Madam, 
and the New Way to Pay Old Debts, are his best-known productions. 
The last-mentioned has kept possession of the stage, chiefly on account 
of the effective and original character of Sir Giles Overreach. 

" Massinger's comedy resembles Ben Jonson's, in its eccentric strength and wayward 
exhibitions of human nature. The greediness of avarice, the tyranny of unjust laws, 
and the miseries of poverty, are drawn with a powerful hand. The luxuries and 
vices of a city life, also, afford Massinger scope for his indignant and forcible invective. 
Genuine humor or sprightliness he had none. II is dialogue is often coarse and indeli- 
cate, and his characters in low life too depraved. The tragedies of Mussinger have a 
calm and dignified seriousness, a lofty pride, that impresses the imagination very 
strongly. His genius was more eloquent and descriptive than impassioned or inven- 
tive ; yet his pictures of suffering virtue, its struggles and its trials, are calculated to 
touch the heart, as well as gratify the taste. His versification is smooth and mel- 
lifluous." — Chambers. 

William Kowley was an actor, and a dramatist of 
some note, contemporary with Decker, Webster, Massinger, 
Ford, &c. 

Rowley was the author, in whole or in part, of a large number of plays. The fol- 
lowing are the principal : The Travails of tlie English Brothers : The World Tost at 
Tennis ; A New Wonder, a Woman Never Vexed; A Shoemaker a Gentleman ; A Match 
at Midnight; The Spanish Gipsy ; The Birth of Merlin ; The Parliament of Love, &c. 

John Ford, 1586-1639, was a dramatist of great dis- 
tinction, contemporary with and succeeding Shakespeare. 



AND THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 95 

Ford was of good family, and was bred to the law ; and though he 
gave much time to dramatic compositions, he did not depend upon it 
entirely for support, nor Avas he obliged, like some of the writers of 
that day, to sacrifice his judgment to his necessities. He had ample 
means of living, independently of the stage, and whatever plays he 
produced were made according to his deliberate taste and predetermi- 
nation. 

Raak and Character. — According to Charles Lamb, "Ford was of 
the first order of the poets." The general verdict of the critics is that 
this is too high an estimate. All, however, assign Ford a high rank. 
His blank verse is soft and musical. He excelled in depicting scenes 
which awaken tenderness and pathos, and he could be terribly tragic ; 
but he failed entirely in the comic. This prevailing want of geniality 
seems to have belonged to his private life as well as to his poetry. Sir 
John Suckling, in his Session of the Poets, says of him : 
" In his dumps John Ford alone by himself sat, 
Yvlth folded arms and melancholy hat." 
His gravest faults lay in the choice of his subjects. He seemed to de- 
light in depicting incestuous passion, as in The Brother and Sister, 
and to dally with other forbidden themes which awake the slum- 
bering fires of wickedness in the human heart. 

"He delighted in the sensation of intellectual power; he found himself strong in 
the imagination of crime and of agony; his moi-al sense was gratified bj indignation 
at the dark possibilities of sin, by compassion for rare extremes of suffering. He ab- 
horred vice, he admired virtue ; but ordinary vice and virtue were to him, as light 
wine to a dram drinker. His genins was a telescope, — ill adapted for neighboring ob- 
jects, but powerful to bring witliin the sphere of vision what nature has wisely placed 
at an unsociable distance. Unquestionably he displayed great power in these horrors, 
which was all he desired; but had he been 'of the first order of poets,' he would have 
found and displayed superior power in familiar matters of to-day, — in failings to 
which all are liable, virtues which all may practise, sorrows for which all may be 
better."' — Hartley Caleridge. 

WorJcs. — The principal plays of Ford are the following: Brother and Sister; Love's 
Sacrifice; The Broken Heart; The Lover's !\Ielancholy ; Perkin Warbeck.ahistoric.il 
drama; The Lady's Trial; Beauty in a Trance. He wrote a much larger number. 
His complete works have been printed in 2 vols. 8vo. 

Thomas Heywood was an actor, a dramatic poet, and 
a prose writer, in the times of Elizabeth, James I., and 
Charles I. 

"Works. — The plays Avhich Heywood wrote, or helped to write, 
amount to two hundred and twenty, but only twenty-three have been 



96 SHAKESPEARE 

preserved. The best known are, A Woman Killed with Kindness, The 
English Traveller, The Late Lancashire Witches. The best of his 
other writings are An Apology for Actors, Nine Books of History con- 
cerning Woman, England's Elizabeth, General History of Woman. 

Style. — Hey wood's style is the exact reverse of Marlowe's ; it is 
easy, and free from all extravagance. The plot of the dramas is care- 
fully elaborated. But there is a want of vigor which prevents Hey- 
wood from rising to the first rank of dramatists. 

Thomas Eandolph, 1605-1634, was a dramatist of superior abili- 
ties, but he accomplished little on account of the irregularities of his 
life. 

Randolph was educated partly at Oxford and partly at Cambridge. Coming to Lon- 
don, he attracted the attention of Ben Jonson, who admired the brilliancy of his tal- 
ents, and introduced him into the gay society of the dramatic wits. Randolph fell 
into intemperate habits, and died young. 

Randolph achieved no great sviccess, but wrote several plays which have decided 
merit: The Muses' Looking-Glass; Aristippus, or The Jovial Philosopher; The Jeal- 
ous Lover; Augustus, or the Impossible Dowry, etc. His best piece was The Muses' 
Looking-Glass, which, however, can hardly be called a drama, though written for the 
stage. It contains many contrasted portraits of virtues and vices which are better as 
detached fragments than in their original setting. One of his similes is worthy of 
quotation : 

" Justice, like lightning, ever should appear 
To few men's ruin, but to all men's fear." 

Anthony Mundat, 1553-1663, was among the crowd of second-class dramatists of 
his day. 

Munday was concerned in fourteen plays, the most noted being that of Sir John 
Oldcastle. He wrote also The Banquet of Dainty Conceits, The Fountain of Fame, 
The Pain of Pleasure, and some other poems. 

James Shiuley, 1596-1666, was the lust of the great 
school of dramatists of the Shakespearian era. 

Career. — Shirley was born in London, and educated at Cambridge. 
He took orders in the church, but becoming a Catholic, resigned his 
position, and endeavored to establish himself as a classical teacher. Not 
succeeding in this, he began writing poems and plays. The ordinance 
of the Long Parliament, prohibiting the exhibition of stage-plays, 
obliged Shirley again to resort to school-teaching as a means of sub- 
sistence, and his Academy at White Friars was the resort of many 
who "afterwards proved most eminent in divers faculties." Subse- 
quently, however, he resumed his chosen occupation as a dramatist, 
and produced a large number of plays. 



AND THE EARLY DRAMATISTS. 97 

Worhs. — Shirley's Complete Works were edited by William Gifford, in 6 vols., 8vo, 
with a biography by Alexander Dyce. Shirley wrote some books in connection with 
his craft as a schoolmaster: The Way Made Plain to the Latin Tongue; An English 
and Latin Grammar; The Rudiments of Grammar, the rules being in English verse; 
Introduction to English, Latin, and Greek; An E.ssay towards a Universal and Ra- 
tional Grammar, etc. As a di-amatist he ranks among the best of the second class. 
Of his plays, which are numerous. The Gamesters is considered the best. 

"James Shirley claims a place amongst the authors of this period, not so much for 
any transcendent talent in himself, as that he was the last of a great race, all of wliom 
spoke nearly the same language, and had a set of moral feelings and notions in com- 
mon. A new language, and quite a new turn of tragic and comic interest, came in 
with the Restoration." — Charles Lamb. 

EXTRACTS. 

Reply of Caesar to Ptolemy, King of Egypt, when the latter, having 
secured the head of Pompey, brought it to the conqueror. 

CcBsar. Egyptians, dare ye think your highest pyramids, 
Built to outdare the sun, as you suppose. 
Where your unworthy kings lie rak'd in ashes, 
Are monuments fit for him ? No, brood of Nilus, 
Nothing can cover his high fame but heaven, 
No pyramids set off his memories. 
But the eternal substance of his greatness. 
To whicii I leave him. Take the head away, 
And, with the body, give it noble burial : 
Your earth shall now be bless' d to hold a Koman, 
Whose braveries all the world's earth cannot balance. 

If I knew what 
To send you for a present, king of Egypt, 
I mean a head of equal reputation, 
And that you lov'd, tho' 'twere your brightest sister's 
(But her you hate), I would not be behind you. 

Ptol. Hear me, great Csesar ! 

Ccesar. I have heard too much ; 
And study not with smooth shows to invade 
My noble mind, as you have done my conquest: 
You 're poor and open. I must tell you roundly, 
That man that could not recompense the benefits, 
The great ajid bounteous services of Pompey, 
Can never dote .upon the name of Csesar, 

9 G 



98 ENGLISH LITEEATUEE. 

Though I hated Pompey, and allow'd his ruin, 

I gave you no commission to perform it. 

Hasty to please in blood are seldom trusty; 

And, but I stand environ' d with my victories, 

My fortune never failing to befriend me, 

My noble strengths, and friends about my person, 

I durst not try you, nor expect a courtesy. 

Above the pious love you show'd to Pompey. 

You've found me merciful in arguing with ye; 

Swords, hangmen, fires, destructions of all natures, 

Demolishmenls of kingdoms, and whole ruins, 

Are wont to be my orators. Turn to tears, 

You wretched and poor reeds of sun-burnt Egypt, 

And now you've found the nature of a conqueror. 

That you cannot decline, with all your flatteries. 

That where the day gives light, will he himself still ; 

Know how to meet his worth with humane courtesies I 

Go, and embalm those bones of that great soldier. 

Howl round about his pile, fling on yOur spices. 

Make a Sabean bed, and place this phenix 

Where the hot sun may emulate his virtues. 

And draw another Pompey from their ashes 

Divinely great, and fix him 'mongst the worthies ! 

Beaumont and Fletcher. 



To My Own Soul. 
Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, 

Fooled by these rebel powers that thee array. 
Why dost thou pine within, and sufler dearth. 

Painting thy outward walls so costly gay ? 
Why so large cost, having so short a lease. 

Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? 
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess. 

Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end? 
Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss, 

And let that pine, to aggravate thy store; 
Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross ; 

Within be fed, without be rich no more : 
So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men, 
And, death once dead, there 's no more dying then. 

Shakespeare. 




CHAPTER VII. 

Bacon and Contemporary Prose Writers. 

The writers who flourished durinsr the reio-ns of Elizabeth 
and James I., or from 1550 to 1625, have been arranged 
into three chapters, under the heads severally of Spenser, 
Shakespeare, and Bacon. 

Note. — Spenser, Shakespeare, and Bacon were to some extent con- 
temporaneous. Yet there was in each case a perceptible interval of 
at least fifteen years. Spenser was at his meridian about 1595, Shake- 
speare about 1610, and Bacon about 1625. A still greater separation 
was produced by their different associations and habits of living. The 
dramatists of that day formed, to a great extent, a class by themselves, 
living mostly at taverns, and having little social intercourse with those 
in the higher circles. Spenser, on the other liand, and other poets 
of his class, were mostly connected with the higher orders, either as 
members or as retainers, of some noble family, and were under influ- 
ences very different from those which prevailed among the dramatists. 

Bacon. 

Francis Bacon, Baron Verulam, 1561-1626, commonly 
known as Lord Bacon, was one of the greatest of modern 
philosophers. 

Bacon was gifted by nature with abilities of the highest order, and 
he had every advantage which education and liigh birth could be- 
stow for giving his abilities development and exercise. His father 
held the highest office but one in the Court of Queen Elizabeth ; his 
mother was a woman of great natural abilities and genuine nobleness 

99 



100 BACON 

of character, as well as of profound scholarship ; his tutors were men of 
learning and genius ; the society in which he mingled from boyhood 
included all that was greatest and noblest in the kingdom. 

Bacon entered the University (Cambridge) at the age of twelve, was 
admitted to Gray's Inn as student of law at sixteen, and soon after 
went abroad for the purpose of perfecting himself in French and of 
studying foreign institutions. 

On the death of his father, in 1579, Bacon, then eighteen years of 
age, returned to England and applied himself to his legal studies. He 
rose rapidly in the profession ; was elected to Parliament at the age of 
twenty-four, and continued to sit in every House of Commons until 
1614, a period of twenty-nine years. 

Bacon's parliamentary eloquence is spoken of in high terms by Ben Jonson. " His 
language, when he could spare or pass a jest, was nobly censorious [censor-like]. No 
man ever spoke more neatly, more freely, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, 
less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of speech but consisted of his own 
graces. His hearers could not cough or look aside from him without loss. lie com- 
manded when he spoke, and had his judges angry or pleased at his devotion. No 
man had their affections more in his power. The fear of every man that heard him 
was lest he should make an end." 

Bacon's principal patron, during this part of his career, was the Earl of Essex. On 
the downfall of that nobleman. Bacon had the meanness and the ingi-atitude, not only 
to turn against him, but to profit by his friend's misfortunes. 

Rise to Power. — On the accession of James I., 1603, Bacon rose 
rapidly to the highest offices in the gift of the sovereign. He was then 
at the age of forty- two. He married a lady of wealth in 1606, was 
made solicitor-general in 1607, one of the judges in 1611, and attorney- 
general in 1613, was appointed keeper of the great seal in 1617, and 
lord high chancellor in 1618. In the same year he was raised to the 
peerage as Baron Verulam, and in 1620 was made Viscount St. Albans. 
The same year also he published his greatest work, The Novum Orga- 
num. No wonder Jonson said of him, on his sixtieth birthday, 1620 : 
" Whose even thread the Fates spin round and full 
Out of their choicest and their whitest wool." 

His Fall. — Jonson was mistaken. In little more than a year there- 
after, this round, full thread suddenly gave way, not cut by the shears 
of Atropos, but destroyed by the tooth of that meanest of insects, moth. 
Bacon's love of gold got the better of his nobler principles. Though 
in the receipt of a princely revenue from the fees of his office and from 
his professional services, he added still further to his income by taking 
direct bribes as a Judge and giving decisions expressly for money. 

Conviction and Sentence. — A committee of inquiry being instituted in Parlia- 
ment, Bacon at first indignantly denied the charges. But when the proofs were ad- 



AND CONTEMPORARY PROSE WRITERS. 101 

duced, he confessed his guilt in these memorable words: "I do plainly and ingenu- 
ously confess that I am guilty of corruption, and do renounce all defence." A com- 
mittee of the House of Lords having waited on him, to know if this confession was 
genuine, he replied : " My Lords, it is my act, my hand, my heart. I beseech your 
lordships to be merciful to a broken reed ! " He was sentenced to pay a fine of £-10,01)0, 
made incapable of holding office, and imprisoned during the pleasure of the king. 
This sentence, however, was scarcely pronounced before it was mitigated. He was 
sent to the Tower, but in two days was set at liberty. The fine soon after was remit- 
ted. He was even allowed to present himself at Court, and he was granted a pension 
of £1200 a year. He spent the rest of his life, about five years, in retirement, occu- 
pied chiefly with scientific pursuits. 

" If parts allure thee, see how Bacon shined, 
The wisest, brightest, meai:iest of mankind." — Pope. 

Bacon's downfall is the most lamentable in history. Not that he was worse than 
thousands of others in public position. But his transcendent greatness in other re- 
spects makes his meanness only the more damaging. 

His Works. — Bacon's works have been published in 17 vols. 8vo. The greatest 
of these is Instauratio Magna, the great instauration, or restoration, of the sciences. 
Part first of the Instauratio is De Augmentis Scientiarum, or the advancement of 
learning. Part second is Novum Organum, the new instrument or method of pursuing 
the sciences, the term referring to Aristotle's method, called Organum. There are 
four other parts, the whole forming a grand outline of the possibilities of human 
knowledge and of the methods of discovery. 

Other Worhs. — Bacon published some legal disqiiisitions which are regarded by 
jurists as worthy of his high renown. His most popular work was a small volume of 
Essays, of which countless editions have been sold. They were written in English, 
expressly for popular reading, and on topics which, in his own language, came home 
to the " business and bosoms " of all. He wrote also a collection of Apothegms, which 
has been very popular. Another book of his was De Sapientia Veterura, On the Wis- 
dom of the Ancients, which was translated into English during his lifetime. 

Style. — Bacon has an aphoristic style of writing, which has been noticed by all 
critics. It occurs in the Novum Organum, as well as in the Essays. It gives the 
reader the idea of one who has meditated long upon what he has to say, until the 
truth about it has become perfectly clear to'his own mind, and then it is put forth, 
not in the shape of argument, or for discussion, but as so much fixed truth, to be re- 
ceived into the consciousness of the reader. No finer specimens of English prose are 
to be found than in Bacon's Essays. 



Miscellaneous Writers. 

Roger Ascham, 1515-1569, is famous as the tutor of 
Queen Elizabeth, and as the author of two admirable works, 
one on archery, ToxopJiiliis, and one on education. The 
Schoolmaster. 

Ascham was tutor in Latin and Greek to the Princess, afterwards 
9* 



102 BACON 

Queen Elizabeth ; was Latin secretary to Edward VI.; and afterwards 
to Queen Mary. 

A^scham's English. — Ascliam, though celebrated for his Latin seholarsJiip, 
was among the first to disLavd foreign and learned words and to write pure English 
prose. It had become very mucli the fashion in his day for scholars to despise their 
mother tongue, and either to write in Latin, or to interlard their discourse continually 
with Latin, French, and Italian words. They had the idea, unfortunately not yet 
obsolete, that writing in plain English betrayed a want of education. No man of that 
day had greater facility in Latin composition than Ascham. He wrote Latin with 
liie same ease and rapidity with which he wrote English, and he published several 
work^ in Latin. 

Enylish Works. — The works by which Ascham is best, as well as most favorably 
known, are Toxopliilus, an ingenious and pleasant defence of archery as a pasiime, and 
'llie Schoolmaster, which he himself descril)es as a plain and perfect way of teaching 
children to understand, write, and speak the Latin tongue, but especially purposed 
for the private bringing up of youth in gentlemen's and noblemen's houses. In these 
works Ascham gave an example of pure English which was not lost upon his contem- 
poraries, and in this respect he did a signal service to letters. There is also some- 
thing very genial and pleasing in the tone and style of these works, which have made 
them great favorites. The " Schoolmaster " especially has been held in high esteem, 
not only for its excellencies of style, but for the many valuable ideas it contains on 
the subject of education, and for the interesting pictures it gives us of the state of 
education in those times. 



Reginald Scott, 1599, a man of learning, led a recluse life, 

dividing liis time between gardening and the study of writers on the 
black arts. 

Scott wrote two works : A Perfect Platform of a Hop Garden, and The Discovery of 
Witchcraft. In the latter, he attacked the current belief in witches, alchemy, and 
astrology, and was so far in advance of his times that he suffered persecution for his 
free opinions. 

Sir Thomas Wilsox, 1581, is the earliest writer in English 

on the subject of criticism. 

Wilson was educated at Eton and Cambridge ; resided abroad during the reign of 
Queen Mary. and. happening to be in Rome, was imprisoned for a time as a supposed 
heretic ; returned to England on the accession of Elizabeth, and rose to be Dean of 
Durham and to various high state appointments. 

Besides some works in Latin, Wilson wrote TJie Art of Logic, and Ilie A rt of Rhetoric, 
both works of great excellence. The latter is especially noticeable for the earnestness 
and vigor with which the author advocates simplicity of style and language. He 
condemns the prevalent allitei-ation, and also the practice of using foreign and 
learned words, instead of homely English. 

Wilson gives the following caricature of the vicious style of alliteration: " Pitiful 
poverty prayeth for a penny, but puffed presumption passeth not a point, pampering 
his paunch with pestilent pleasure, procuring his passport to post it to hell-pit, there 
to be punished with pains perpetual." 



AND COXTEMPOEARY PEOSE WRITEES. 103 

Francis Meres also was a writer on criticism. He flourished about 
the year 1600, and is now chiefly known on account of his references 
to Shakespeare. 

Meres ^yrote. besides some other things, a work called Palladis Tamia, or Wit's 
Treasury, being a Comparative Discourse of our English Poets with the Greek, Latin, 
and Italian Poets. This was published in 1597-8, and is important as showing that 
Shakespeare was then publicly recognized as a poet of high order. 

JoHX Florio, 1625, a native of London, though of Italian 

origin, was a lexicographer and pedant, and a resolute stickler for rule. 

Florio declared that " the Plays which they do play in England are neither right 
Comedies nor right Tragedies ; but representations of Histories, without any decorum," 
a grosvl intended evidently for Shakespeare. Florio is supposed to have been the 
original of Holofernes the Schoolmaster, in Love's Labor Lost ; if so, Shakespeare cer- 
tainly had his revenge. 

Works.— Florio His First Fruits, which yield familiar speech, merry proverbs, 
witty sentences, and golden sayings ; Florio His Second F)-iiits, yielding six thousand 
Italian Proverbs ; A Wnj-Id of Words, being a dictionary in Italian and English ; Dia- 
logues of Grammar, Italian and English; and various translations. 

Leoxard Digges, 1 573, an eminent mathematician, educated at Oxford. Works : 

Tectonicon, Measuring of Land, etc. ; A Prognostication to Judge of tHe Weather; An 
Arithmetical Military Treatise, etc. 

Thomas Digges, 1595. son of Leonard. Besides editing his father's works he 

published A Geometrical Treatise, Puntometvia ; England's Defense ; Celestial Orbs, etc. 

Leonard Digges, Jr., 1588-1635, grandson of the first Leonard, and son of Thomas. His 
genius ran more to literature, and less to mathematics, than that of the other mem- 
bers of the family. Works : The Rape of Proserpine, translated from the Latin ; 
Gerardo, translated from the Spanish ; Commendatory Verses on Shakespeare ; Poems, 
etc. " A great master of the English language, a perfect understauder of the French 
and Spanish, a good poet, and no mean orator." — Antliony Wood. 

Sir Dudley Digges, 1583-1639, also grandson of the first Leonard, and son of 
Thomas. He wrote on political subjects : Right and Privilege of the Subject; Four 
Paradoxes ; Defence of the India Trade, &c. 

Dudley Digges. Jr., son of the preceding, also wrote on political subjects : The 
Unlawfulness of Subjects taking up Arms against their Sovereign, etc. 

John Napier, 1550-1617, is widely known as the inventor 
of Logarithms. 

History. — Xapier was Laird of Merchiston, and ancestor of the 
Kaplers wlio have in recent times so greatly distinguished themselves 
in the arts both of war and of peace. He was educated at the University 
of St. Andrew's, travelled afterwards in France, Italy, and Germany, 



104 BACON 

and on his return occupied himself with mathematical pursuits and 
theology. In the retirement and seclusion of his castle, he invented 
the system of Logarithms — a system which came complete in all its 
parts from the hands of its inventor, and which reduced to an incredi- 
ble extent the labors of scientific computation in all coming time. 

Napier's other works were a treatise on the book of Revelation, entitled A Plain 
Discovery of the Whole Revelation of St. John ; Secret Inventions, a Letter to Anthony- 
Bacon, etc. 

" The title of great man is more justly due [to him] than to any other whom his 
country ever produced. These works [on Logarithms and on Revelation] will remain 
lasting monuments of his sublime judgment, kn£)wledge, and penetration.". — Hume,. 

"The invention of Logarithms," remarks Mr. Hallam, "is one of the rarest in- 
stances of sagacity in the history of mankind; and it has been justly noticed as re- 
markable that it issued complete from the mind of its author and has npt received 
any improvement since his time." — Hist, of Europe. 

" His sublime invention of Logarithms about this epoch eclipsed every minor im- 
provement, and as far transcended the denary notation as this had surpassed the 
numeral system of the Greeks." — Si7- John Leslie. 

" It is strange that the vigils of a recluse who communed in a feudal castle with the 
then mysterious world of figures and of signs should, after the lapse of near three 
hundred years, be recommending his posterity to the benevolence of an American 
College." — Robert C. Winthrop. 

Sir John Da vies, 1570-1626, was a man of great legal erudition 
and acuteness in the days of Elizabeth, and rose gradually to the high 
distinction of Lord Chief Justice. 

In addition to his law writings, and to some important political tracts, Davies wrote 
an extended philosophical poem, which has been much admired. It is called Nosce 
Teipsum, Know Thyself, and is divided into two parts, Of Human Knowledge, and Of 
the Soul of Man. 

"In the happier parts of his poem, we come to logical truths so well illustrated by 
ingenious similes, that we know not whether to call the thoughts more poetically or 
more philosophically just. The judgment and fancy are reconciled, and the imagery 
of the past seems to start more vividly from the surrounding shades of abstraction." 
— Camphell. 

Sir Henry Savile, 1549-1621, "the most learned Englishman in 
profane literature of the reign of Elizabeth" (Hallam), was tutor in 
mathematics and Greek to the Queen, and held various honorary ap- 
pointments at Oxford. 

Savile was a man of large wealth, and founded at Oxford the Professorships of Geom- 
etry and Astronomy. He published a sumptuous critical edition of Chrysostom, in 8 
vols., fol., at an expense of £8,000 ; also, editions of William of Malmesbury and seve- 
ral others of the Latin chroniclers of England. He translated the Agricola of Tacitus, 
and Four P.ooks of the Histories; and wrote Commentaries on Roman Warfare. He 
was one of the men appointed by King James as Translators of the Bible. 



AND CONTEMPORARY PROSE WRITERS. 105 

Annie Bacon, 1528-1600, daughter of Sir Anthony Cook, was wife 
of Sir Nicholas Bacon, and mother of the philosopher Sir Francis 
Bacon, 

This distinguished lady, like the Lady Jane Grey and Queen Elizabeth, and many 
other noble ladies th;it we read of in that a.i<e, was educated far beyond the point 
reached by young ladies now-a-days. Among her other accomplishments, she was 
well versed in Greek, Latin, aad Italian. In sending a manuscript to Archbishop 
Parker, she accompanied it by a letter to that prelate in Greek, which he likewise 
answered in Greek. She published several works, all of which, however, were trans- 
lations : Twenty-five Sermons, from the Italian, on Predestiuation and Election ; Bishop 
Jewel's Apology for the Church of England, from the Latin. 

Philemon Holland, M.D., 1552-1636, a graduate and Fellow of Trinity College, 
Cambridge, and Ile^d- Master of Coventry Free School, was famous in his day for his 
numerous translations of Latin and Greek authors into English, insomuch that he had 
the name of Translator-General. Among the works translated by Holland were the 
following: Livy, Pliny's Natural History, Plutarch's Works, Sueotonius, Ammius 
Marcellinus, Xenophon's Cyropasdia. He also translated Camden's Britannia. 

Egbert Burton, 1576-1640, a quaint and learned writer, is known 
almost exclusively by his one work, The Anatomy of Melancholy. 

Burton was a mathematician as well as a linguist, and " a curious calculator of na- 
tivities." He made a calculation of his own Nativity, predicting that he would die at 
a certain time, " which being exact, several of the students did not forbear to whisper 
among themselves that, rather than there should be a mistake in the calculation, he 
sent up his soul to heaven thro' a strap about his neck ! " — Wood's Athen. Oxon. 

The Anatomy of Melancholy contains a vast amount of curious lore, and the book 
has been a general favorite among scholarly people, Avho had the learning and the 
leisure to follow him in his quiet and somewhat sombre musings. 

Lord Edward Herbert of Cherbury, 1551-1648, was a man 
of considerable note, both as a statesman and as a writer. 

Lord Herbert was educated at University College, London. He 
served in the Continental wars, and also as ambassador to France. 

Lord Herbert's writings are of two classes: the grave and the light. The former 
comprises his treatises De Veritate, and Dp, Rdigione GndiUum, and a History of Henry 
VIII. The treatises are thoroughly deistical in their nature, and may be regarded as 
the forerunners of the Bolingbroke-Sliaftsbury school. The History has been pro- 
nounced by Ilallam to be "written in a manly and judicious spirit." The lighter 
pieces are some fugitive poems, and an autobiography in which he exposes himself 
in all his strength and his weakness, as a brave soldier, a quai-reller over punctilios, 
a hater of bigotry, and himself a bigot to philosophy. 

Sir Richard Baker, 1568-1645, has a place in literature on 
account of his famous Chronicles of the Kings of England. 



106 * BACON 

Sir Eichard was descended of a good family, and was a man of con- 
siderable estate ; but having lost the latter by becoming surety for some 
of his relations, he was thrown into the Fleet prison, where he died. 
He took to authorship to console him in his sorrows, as well as to pro- 
vide for his necessities. 

He wrote Meditations and Disquisitions on the Lord's Praj^er, and on several of the 
Psalms, Apology for a Layman's writing Divinity, and a poem called Cato's Moral 
Distiches. His chief \york, however, and the only one by which he is at all known, is 
Chronicle of the Kings of England. Baker's Chronicle was about the only history 
that Englishmen hiid until the publication of Rapin. The critics denounced it as un- 
Bcholarly and inaccurate. But it was written in a pleasant, entertaining style, and it 
continued for a long time to be published and read, holding its place in the old-fash- 
ioned chimney-corners, on the same shelf with the Family Bible and Fox's Book of 
Martyrs. Addison, in his picture of Eoger De Coverly, describes him as drawing 
" many observations together, out of his reading of Baker's Chronicle." 

John Spotiswood, 1565-1639, is chiefly known by a History of 
the Church of Scotland. 

Spotiswood was a native of Scotland, educated at the University of Glasgow. He 
became Archbishop of St. Andrew's, a member of the Privy Council, and finally Chan- 
cellor of Scotland, a dignity which no churchman had held since the Reformation. 
As Primate of the Scottish Church, he had the chief management of ecclesiastical 
afEiiirs, and great influence also in political matters. He was in great favor with Charles 
I., and also with James I. Entering, though with reluctance, into the measures of 
James to introduce a liturgy into the Scottish Church, he fell under the displeasure 
of the Covenanters, and was obliged to escape to England, v.here he died. Besides a 
Latin treatise, he wrote the well-known History of the Church of Scotland, 3 vols.. 8vo. 

Travels, History, Antiquities, &c. 

Captain John Smith, 1579-1631, so famous in the early 
history of Virginia, has a place also in literature and in 
general history. 

Early History. — Smith is a type of the better class of English ad- 
venturers in the times of Queen Elizabeth. The destined founder of 
Virginia made several attempts, when still a mere boy, to run away 
from home. In his sixteenth year he served as a volunteer in the wars 
in the IjOW Countries. In 1600 he joined the Austrian army under 
Baron Kissell, then fighting against the Turks. He was captured by 
the Turks and carried to Constantinople as a slave. His young mis- 
tress sent him to her brother Timour, pasha of the district on the Sea 
of Azov, who treated him cruelly. vSmith killed the pasha, and made 
his escape. After wandering through Eussia and Transylvania, and 
engaging in various adventures in Germany and Morocco, he returned 
to England in 1604. 



AND CONTEMPORARY PROSE WRITERS. 107 

Subsequent Career. — In 1606, Smith sailed upon the expedition 
commanded by Newport, and destined to colonize Virginia. The trials 
and misfortunes of this expedition are familiar to the readers of his- 
tory. Smith was the life and soul of the colony. More than once 
Jamestown would have been abandoned but for his energy and fore- 
sight. It was during this period that Smith explored and made his 
celebrated map of Chesapeake Bay. In 1609 he returned to England. 
In 1614 he made a voyage of discovery on the coast of New England, 
and in 1616 settled permanently in England for the remainder of his 
days. 

His Works. — Smith's chief works are A True Eelation of such 
Occurrences of Note as have happened in Virginia, &c., &c., A De- 
scription of New England, The General History of Virginia, New 
England, and the Summer Isles, and the True Travels, Adventures, and 
Observations of Captain John Smith in Europe, Asia, Africa, and 
America. Of the General History, Books II. and IV. are written by 
^ Smith ; the remaining four are edited by him. 

De Tocqueville says of Smith, " his style is simple and concise, his narratives bear 
the stamp of truth, and his descriptions are free from false ornament." 

Character. — Smith has always borne the reputation of being a stout-hearted and 
kind-hearted man, a prudent as well as bold captain, and an upright judge. His name 
was held by the Indians in great reverence. The story of his romantic rescue by Po- 
^ cahontas, so long and so universally received witliout question, has been rejected 
lately by seveial investigators. If false, the story has at least its justification in 
Smith's character and personal influence. John Smith has become the type of the 
Virginia colonist, as Miles Standish is looked upon as the type of the Puritan settlers 
of Massachusetts. Upon the whole. Smith seems to have been the more genial and 
the abler man of the two, with broader views and more varied resources. 

Sherley Brothers. These were three Englishmen of rank and for- 
tune, who spent many years in travel in Turkey and Persia, and on 
their return to Europe published various accounts of what they had 
seen. They were Sir Anthony Slierley, 1565-1630; Sir Robert Sher- 

ley, 1570-1628 ; Sir Thomas Sherley, 1564 . 

The account of what they saw and heard is published in various forms by different 
authors, who seem to liave gleaned the information by the process now familiarly 
known among reporters as " interviewing." The following is the title of one of these 
works. The Three Englitsh Brothers : Sir Thomas Sherley, his Travels, with his Three 
Years' Imprisonment in Turkey: Sir Anthony Sherley, his Embassage [ho came back, 
as our Mr. Burlingarae did, an Ambassador from the Emperor of Persia to the Euro- 
pean Powers] ; Master Robert Sherley, his Wars against the Turks and Marriage to the 
Emperor of Persia's Niece. 

George Sandys, 1577-1643, a son of Archbishop Sandys, was a man 
of great repute in his day, as well for liis travels as for his learning 
and literary ability. 

V 



108 BACON- 

Sandys travelled extensively in the East, and also lived for a time in Yirgiuia, where 
he was treasurer of the colony. He published a hook, in folio, of travels, Relation of 
a Journe>' begun in 1610, containing a description of the Turkish Empire, of the Holj' 
Land, and of the remote parts of Italj', a work of far more importance then than such 
a work would be now, when books of travel are so abundant ; Ovid"s Metamorphoses 
Englished; Paraphrases upon tlie Psalms of David, Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, 
Job, Lamentations of Jeremiah, &c., being metrical versions of these several works; 
Christ's Passion, a Tragedy. The version of Ovid's Metamorphoses was one of the 
earliest pieces of pure literary work done in America, having been written ou the bank 
of the James River, Yirginia. 

Thomas Coryat, 1577-1617, was celebrated for his pedes- 
trian excursions. 

Coryat travelled through France, Germany, and Italy, walking 1975 
miles. More than half of this he accomplished in one pair of shoes, 
and on returning he himg them up in the village church. He was a 
half-witted, or half-crazed, sort of person, and was kept in the service 
of Henry Prince of "Wales as Court Fool. 

Worhs. — Coryat wrote accounts of his various travels, which contain much 
curious information : Coryafs Crudities, hastily gobbled up in Five Months' Travels, 
etc.; Corj-at's Crambe, or his Colwort Twice Sodden, and now served up with other 
Macaronic Dishes ; Traveller for the English Wits, etc. He died in Surat, after having 
explored Greece; Egypt, "Western Asia, and India. 

John Dayis, 1605, was the celebrated British navigator from 

whom the strait of that name was called. 

Davis made three voyages for the discovery of a northwest passage to the Indies ; 
Bailed with Cavendish to the South Seas ; and made five voyages to the East. He pub- 
lished The World's Ilydrographical Description ; A Report of Three Voyages for the 
Discovery of the Northwest Passage, etc. His works are mostly contained in Hak- 
luyt's Collection of Voyages. 

Richard Ede>'', in the middle and latter half of the sixteenth century, translated 
into English from the Latin and the Spanish a number of Voyages and works on Navi- 
gation, which contributed quite as much probably to the roving enterprise of English 
navigators as did the more celebrated Hakluyfs Voyages. 

"Eden was the first Englishman who undertook to present in a collective form the 
astohishing merits of that spirit of maritime enterprise which had been everywhere 
awakened by the discovery of America." — Rich's Bill. Am. 

Richard Hakluyt, 1553-1616, contributed to the literature of 
voyages and travels by the valuable collection which he published, 
commonly known as Hakluyi's Voyages. 

Hakluyt was educated at Oxford, and afterwards took orders in the Church of Eng- 
land. He was not a traveller himself, but merely a publisher of the travels of others. 
To his zeal and industry it is that we owe the preservation of many accounts of voy- 



AND CONTEMPORARY PROSE WRITERS. 109 

ages that would otherwise have been lost. The work upon which his fame chiefly 
rests is : " The Principal Navigations, Voyages, TraflBques, and Discoveries of the Eng- 
lish Nation," etc., published in 1589, folio, commonly called Hakluyt's Voyages. Hav- 
ing become very scarce, this work was reprinted, 1809-12, 5 vols., 4to., with a large 
supplement. Hakluyt's Voyages contain an immense amount of information relative 
to the early settlement of America. In 1846 a society was established for the purpose 
of editing accounts of ancient ti-avels, and named, in his honor, the Ilakluyt Society. 

Samuel, Purchas, D. D., 1577-1628, a man of great erudition and 
of indomitable industry, devoted himself to the work of exploring all 
the known voyages and travels in every part of the world, and tran- 
scribing their contents for the information of English readers. 

Fiirchas's first work was called Purchas His Pilgrimage. It was in one volume 
folio, and contained the substance of all the old chroniclers of voyages and travels, but 
given in his own language. His other work was in 4 vols, folio, and was called Purchas 
His Pilgrims. It was a reprint of tbose old authors, only arranged and put together 
according to the compiler's own method. The five volumes commonly go together as 
one work, under the title of Purchases Pilgrims. The work is the usual companion to 
Hakluyt's Voyages. 

John Stow, 1525-1805; is one of the most celebrated of the early 
English antiquarians. 

Sis Career. — Stow was brought up to the trade of a tailor, but at the age of 
forty, " leaving his own peculiar gains," to use his own words, he '• consecrated him- 
self to the search of our famous antiquities." This devotion, instead of bringing him 
distinction, only reduced him to a life and a death of poverty. When nearlj' eighty 
years of age he received from his gracious sovereign, James I., the gift of letters-patent 
authorizing him to beg ! 

Works. — Stow's principal works are : A Summary of Engliah Chronicles, Annals of 
England, and Survey of London. This last is the most important. It is " one of the 
most early, valuable, and interesting of our topographical pieces ; and on it have been 
founded the subsequent descriptions by Hattcm, Seymour, Maitland, Nortliruck, Pen- 
nant, and Malcolm." — Drake's Slinlespeare. Stow also assisted in the continuation of 
Holinshed's Chronicles, Speght's edition of Chaucer, etc. His labors were careful, 
unremitted, impartial, and thoroughly unselfish. 

WiLMAZM Camden, 1551-1623, is another of the eminent English 
antiquaries. His works were written in Latin, but have been trans- 
lated into English. 

WorJiS. — nis principal works nre : Britannia, or a Chorographical Description of 
Great Britain, Ireland, and the Adjacent Islands ; Annals of the Reign of Queen Eliza- 
beth, etc. 

Sir Eobert Bruce Cotton, 1570-1631, was another of England's 
most renowned antiquarians. 

Cotton wrote numerous works of an antiqnarian character: but his chief claim to 
lionor is the noble library which be collected, and which is now in the British Mii- 

10 



110 BACON 

seum. He was imprisoned in the Tower on account of a paper of a treasonable char- 
acter found in his library ; though it was proved afterwards that he was innocent in 
the matter, and did not even know of the existence of the paper. He was released, 
but never recovered from the shock of his false imprisonment and separation from his 
beloved books. The " Cottonian Library " is considered one of the national treasures. 
Some of his works are : Life and Reign of Henry III. of England ; A Narrative of 
Count Gondomar's Transactions during his Embassy to England; The King's Rev- 
enues, etc. 

Theological Writers. 

John Knox, 1505-1572, the great Scottish Reformer, 
though noted mainly for his administrative abilities, has a 
place also in the field of letters. 

Character. — Knox is undoubtedly the grandest figure in the history 
of Scotland. He is "the one man without whom Scotland, as the 
modern world lias known it, would have no existence. He was the 
one antagonist whom Mary Stuart could not soften, nor Maitland de- 
ceive ; he it was that raised the poor commons of his country into a 
stern and rugged people, who might be hard, narrow, superstitious, 
and fanatical, but who nevertheless were men whom neither king, 
noble, nor priest could force again to submit to tyranny." — Froude. 

History. — Knox was ordained a priest in 1530; in 1542 he openly renounced the 
Catholic religion and became a zealous preacher of Protestant doctrines. In 1547, on 
the capture of St. Andrew's, whither he had fled for safety, he was made prisoner, and 
taken to France, but was released in 1549. He then became chaplain to Edward VI. 
(of England.) On the accession of Mary to the English throne, Knox withdrew to the 
Continent, where he spent the three yep^rs from 1555 to 1558 in study and intercourse 
with Calvin. In 1559 he returned to Scotland, and became the master spirit of the 
Scotch Reformation. 

War Jcs. —With one exception, Knox's writings are doctrinal and. polemical in 
their nature, The most famous of these controversial productions, perhaps, is hia 
First Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Segiment of Women, published in 1558, 
while Knox was still at G-eneva. The exception mentioned is the Historic of the Ref- 
ormation of Religioun ivithin the Realmeof Scotland, published after the author's death. 
Knox's biography has been ably written by Dr. McCrie. 

John Jewel, D. D., 1522-1571, was an eminent scholar and divine, 
and one of the leading writers on the Protestant side in the controver- 
sies between Catholics and Protestants. 

History. — Jewel fled to the Continent on the accession of Mary, but returned on 
the accession of Elizabeth, and was made Bishop. He was one of the most learned of 
the English Reformers, and wrote much on the points at issue between the Church 
of England and the Church of Rome. 

Works. — Jewel's works have been published in 8 vols., 8vo. They are mostly 
controversial, and the best of them all. Apologia Ecclesise Anglicanse, (A Defence of the 



AND CONTEMPORARY PROSE WRITERS. Ill 

Church of England,) is in Latin. It is regarded as the ablest work of its kind in that 
generation, 

" It may be said of his surname, nomen, omen ; Jewel his name, and precious his 
virtues." — Fuller. 

William: Whittingham, 1524-1589, was also a writer of some 
note in the Protestant ranks. 

History. — Whittingham was bom at Chester and educated at Oxford. He mar- 
ried a sister of Calvin, was ordained as a Presbyterian minister, and succeeded Knox 
in the church for the English exiles at Geneva. He returned to England, and in 1563 
was promoted to the deanery of Durham, which position he held until his death. 

Worhs. — While at Geneva he was engaged with others in making the transla- 
tion of the Bible, known as the Geneva Version. He also helped in making the trans- 
lation of the Psalms into English metre which goes by the name of Sternhold and 
Hopkins. Whittingham versified five of the Psalms, the 119th being one of them. 
Besides these he versified the Lord's Pi-ayer, the Ten Commandments, the Creeds 
(Apostolic, Nicene, and Athanasian), the Te Deum, and some other portions of the 
Prayer Book. 

John Fox, 1517-1587, is familiarly known as The Mar- 
tyrologist 

History. — Fox was educated at Oxford, where he attained high distinction for 
scholarship. The study of the Greek and Latin Fathers, and of the Schoolmen, became 
a sort of passion with him, and was continued after he left the Universitj', so that at 
the age of thirty he was profoundly learned in that line. He adopted the Reformed 
opinions, and was obliged in consequence to flee to the Continent. There he projected 
and made the first draft of his great work. On the accession of Elizabeth, he returned 
to England, and received an ecclesiastical preferment which gave him leisure to com- 
plete his proposed work. 

Tfie Book of Martyrs. — Fox's work was first published in 1563, in one vol.. fol. 
In subsequent editions, it was enlarged to 2 vols., and then to 3 vols., fol. The title, 
or rather the first part of it, as given by himself, was, Acts and Monuments of these 
Latter and Perilous Bays, Touching Matters of the Cliurch. It is commonly known 
as Fox's Book of Martyrs. 

Approved. — Fox's work received the official approval of the first three Arch- 
bishops, Parker, Grindal, and Wliitgift, and was ordered to be set up for public perusal 
in every parish church in England, and in the common hall of every Archbishop, 
Bishop. Archdeacon, Doan, and Head of a College. The book has had an enormous cir- 
cnlatiou, especially in its abridged forms, though it is no longer read as generally and 
devoutly as it once was. 

Nicholas Sanders, 1527-1580, Regius Professor of Canon 
Law at Oxford, was in his day the chief defender of the 
Catholic cause in England. 

Sanders attended the famous Council of Trent, " where he showed 



112 BACON 

himself to be a man of greaf parts by his several disputations and 
arguings." 

WorJcs. — Among his works in English are the following : TJie Supper of our Lord 
set forth in Six Books, according to the Truth of the Gospel and Catholic Faith ; The 
Hock of the Church, wherein the Primacy of St. Peter and of his Successors the Bishops 
of Rome is proved out of God's Word; A Treatise of the Images of Christ and of his 
Saints, and that it is Unlawful to Break them, and Lawful to Honor them. 

Egbert Pabsons, 1546-lGlO, familiarly known in the history of the 
time as Parsons the Jesuit, was another writer of note on the Catholic 
side. 

History , — Parsons was an eminent scholar of Oxford, who was converted to the 
Catholic religion in 1575, and became a member of the Society of Jesus. After re- 
maining some time in the Jesuit College at Rome, he returned to England and 
labored zealously for the propagation of the doctrines which he had embraced. He 
was a man of distinguished ability, and his writings caused hot and angry discus- 
sion. The following are some of them: A Conference about the Next Succession to 
the Crown of Enghmd, etc ; A Brief Discourse containing Certain Reasons why Cath- 
olics refuse to go to Church ; A Book of Christian Exercise appertaining to Resolu- 
tion ; A Christian Directory guiding Men to their Salvation. 

Lingard, the Catholic historian of England, censures Parsons for the 
tone of some of his political tracts. He says they were unnecessarily 
irritating towards Elizabeth, and provoked her to harsh measures 
towards her Catholic subjects. 

EiCHARD Stanihurst, 1545-1618, was another writer on the Cath- 
olic side, 

Richard Stanihurst was a learned Irishman, uncle to the celebrated Archbishop 
Usher. Becoming a Catholic, he went to the Continent, where he took orders in the 
Church of Rome, and became chaplain to the Governor of the Spanish Netherlands. 
Besides several learned works in Latin, he published The First Four Books of Virgil's 
^neid. Translated into English Heroical Verse. 

John Pitts, 1560-1616, a Catholic writer, is chiefly known by The Lives of the Kings, 
Bishops, Apostolical Men, and Writers of England, 4 vols. The work is valuable on 
account of its biographical information, especially in regard to early English authors. 

James I. of England, 1556-1625, had a great ambition to be con- 
sidered an author. 

He wrote several poetical pieces and prose essays, the most conspicuous of which is 
Tlie Counterblast to Tobacco. King .Tames's merits as a writer are about on a par with 
his merits as a ruler. The universal opinion of his productions is that they are weak 
and commonplace. 

John Aylmee, 1521-1594, A^as a writer on the Episcopal side as 
against the Presbyterians, 



AND CONTEMPOKARY PROSE WRITERS. 113 

Aylmer was tutor to Lady Jane Grey and afterwards Bishop of London. He pub- 
lished a reply to Knox's treatise against the government of women: "An Harbor for 
Faithful and True Subjects, against the Late blown Blast concerning the Government 
of Women." " He was well learned in the languages, was a ready disputant, and a 
deep divine." As a preacher, he sometimes woke up a sleepy or inattentive audience 
by reading them a long extract from the H&brew, and wiien he saw them all wide 
awake, took them to ta.sk for their folly: "when he spake English, whereby they 
might be instructed and edified, they neglected, and hearkened not to it ; and now, to 
read Hebrew, which they understood no word of, they seemed careful and attentive ! " 

Eichard Hooker, 1553-1600, is the ablest advocate of the 
church organization of England that has yet appeared. 

The Ecclesiastical Polity. — Hooker's great work, The Laws of Eccle- 
siastical Polity, is an elaborate and dignified exposition and defence of 
the ministry and ritual of the Church of England, and is an acknowl- 
edged classic on that subject. The style of his book has received uni- 
versal and unqualified approbation, both for the excellency of its 
English, and its entire suitableness to the subject. For the general 
soundness of his judgment, he has received the name of the judicious 
Hooker. 

History, — Hooker was a man of great simplicity of character, easily imposed upon 
by the designing, and was wheedled by the woman with whom he boarded to marry her 
daughter, a vulgar woman of imperious temper, who subjected him to the coarsest 
indignities. His life has been written by Izaak Walton. 

" The finest as well as the most philosophical writer of the Elizabethan period is 
Hooker. The first book of the Ecclesiastical Polity is at this day one of the master- 
pieces of English eloquence. His periods, indeed, are generally much too long and 
too intricate, but portions of them are often beautifully rhythmical ; his language is 
rich in English idiom without vulgarity, and in words of a Latin source without ped- 
antry; he is more uniformly solemn than the usage of later times permits, or even 
than writers of that time, such as Bacon, conversant with mankind as well as books, 
would have reckoned necessary ; but the example of ancient orators and philosophers, 
upon themes so great as those which he discusses, may justify the serious dignity 
from which he does not depart. Hooker is perhaps the first of such in England who 
adorned his prose with the images of poetry: but this he has done more judiciously 
and with more moderation than others of great name : and we must be bigots in Attic 
severity, before we can object to some of his grand figures of speech. We may praise 
him also for avoiding the superfluous luxury of quotations : — a rock on which the 
writers of the succeeding age were so frequently wrecked." — Hallam. 

Richard Bancroft, 1544-1^10, Archbishop of Canterbury in the 
reign of James I., was a zealous opponent of the Puritans. 

Bancroft wrote, among other things, A Survey of the Pretended Holy Discipline 
and Dangerous Positions and Proceedings under Pretence of Reformation and of tho 
Presbyterian Discipline. 

10* H 



114 BACON 

Hugh Beoughton, 1549-1612, one of the most learned theologians 
of the English Church in the seventeenth century, was especially cele- 
brated for his proficiency in Hebrew and Greek, both of which he 
wrote and spoke familiarly. 

Broughton's works were chiefly of a Biblical character • A Consent of the Scrip- 
tures, being a chronological harmony ; A Treatise on Melchisedeck ; On Clirist's 
Descent into Hell; Translations and Expositions of Daniel, Jeremiah, Job, Ajjocalypse, 
etc. He translated the Prophetical Writings into Greek, and the Apocalypsa into 
Hebrew. 

KiCHAED Field, D. D., 1561-1616, a divine of the English Church, 
in great reputation for his learning and piety, wrote an important 
theological work, 0/ the Church. 

John Rainolds, 1549-1607, is worthy of note, as it was by his ad- 
vice and influence that King James ordered the present version of the 
Scriptures to be made. 

Eainolds was Master of Corpus Christ! College, Oxford, and was, in his day, the 
greatest Hebraist in England. He was appointed one of the chief translators, but 
died before entering upon the work. His publications arc chiefly in Latin. The fol- 
lowing are some of those in English : The Sum of tlie Conference between John Rai- 
nolds and John Hart, touching the Head and Faith of the Church; The Overthrow of 
Stage Plays, by the Way of a Controversy betwixt D. Gager and J. Rainolds; Defence 
of the Judgment of the Reformed Church^'S on Divorce: Judgment concerning Episco- 
pacy, etc. 

Miles Smith. 1624, a Bishop in the Ene:lish Church, was also one of the chief 

translators of King James's Version of the Bible. The Preface, which appears in the 
English editions of the Bible, was by him. 

George Abbot, D.D., 1562-1633, Archbishop of Canterbury, a man of great erudi- 
tion, was another of those employed by Kiiie: James in the translation of the Bible. 
Besides his work as a translator, he published an Ex]iosition on Jonah, which is highly 
esteemed, a Brief Description of the Whole World, On Bowing; at the Name of Jesus, 
The Visibility and Succession of the True Cliurch. and s&veral other works in I"]nglish, 
besides a learned theological treatise in Latin. He was a strong opponent of Laud. 

Thomas Bilson, D. D., 153^-1616, an English Bishop of great scholarship, was like- 
wise one of those employed by King James in making our present English Version of 
the Bible. Dr. Bilson and Dr. Miles Smith were the two translators to whom was 
assigned the care of giving the translation its final revision and putting the last hand 
to it. Bilson published sevei-al works, mostly controversial : The Perpetual Govern- 
ment of Christ's Church; The True Difference between Christian Subjection and Un- 
christian Rebellion; Survey of Christ's Suflei-ings for Mans Redemption, 

John Boys, 1560-164:3, a man of great learning, who assisted Sir Heni'y Saville in his 
edition of Clirysostom, v»'as likewise one of the translators appointed by King James 
to make our English Version of the Bible. He translated the Apoci-ypha. 




CHAPTER VIII. 

The English Bible, and Other Public Stand- 
ards OF Faith and Worship- 

No literary works in any language exert so great an 
influence on the speech, the thoughts, and the doings of 
men as those written documents which contain the popular, 
authorized expression of their religious belief and forms of 
worship. 

The Vedas in the Sanskrit and the Koran in the Arabic are the 
most important Hterary treasures in their respective languages. So in 
English, the Version of the Scriptures, the symbols of Faith, and the 
forms of Public Worship, which have been received and used for many 
generations by a large majority of Enghsh-speaking people, must, as 
mere literary treasures, be regarded as second to none whicli the lan- 
guage contains. In the present chapter, therefore, a brief account will 
be given, 1. Of The English Bible, 2. Of The English Prayer-Book, 
3. Of The Shorter Catechism, 4. Of English Hymnody. 

I. THE ENCLISH BIBLE. 

Various English Versions of the Scriptures have been made, begin- 
ning with that of Wyckliffe, 1382, and ending with that made in 1611, 
and commonly known as King James's, or the Authorized Version. 
Some account of these several Versions will now be given. 

1. Wyekliffe's Version. 

The first Version of the entire Bible in English was that 
made by Wyckliffe and his disciples. It was completed 
about the year 1382. 

115 



116 ENGLISH LITERATUEE. 

Eevision. — In 1388, a few years after WycklifFe's death, the work 
was revised and amended by one of his ablest and most trusted fol- 
lowers, Richard Purvey. 

How Circulated. — As the art of printing had not yet been in- 
vented, WycklifFe's Version was dependent upon manuscript copies 
for its circulation. Notwithstanding this inconvenience, the work was 
circulated extensively, and exerted a powerful influence. 

Its Character. — Wyckliffe's Version v/as made from the Vulgate, 
not from the Greek and Hebrew. It is in plain and homely phraseol- 
ogy, and is a fine specimen of the prose English of the fourteenth 
century. 

When Printed. — Wycklifie's New Testament was first printed iu 
1731 ; the whole work was not printed until 1850. 

Movements after Wychlijfe. — After the completion ofWyckliflFe's Version, an 
interval of a century and a half occurred before any further attempts were made in 
this direction. Early in the sixteenth century, in connection with the general reli- 
gious reformation, the subject of an English version of the Scriptures was revived, and 
the work was carried on without interruption for three-fourths of a century. This 
movement began in the reign of Henry VIII., and continued all through the reigns of 
Edward VI., Mary, and Elizabeth, and finally culminated in the i-eign of James I. The 
originator of this movement, and the man who did singly more towards its accomplish- 
ment than any other one man, was William Tyndale. 

2. Tyndale's Version. 

William Tyndale, 1480-1536, translated the New Testa- 
ment, and the Pentateuch and the Historical Books of the 
Old Testament. His New Testament first appeared in 1525. 

Importance of Tyndale's "Version. — The Version made by Tyndale 
was used to a large extent by all the subsequent Protestant translators ; 
it is really the basis of our present version. There is in our present 
version more of Tyndale than of all the other translators put 

together. 

History. — Tyndale was born at Hunt's Court, Gloucestershire, about the year 
1480. lie went at an early age to the University of Oxford, where he soon showed 
that fondness for the Scriptures which was through life the most prominent trait in 
his character. From Oxford he went also to Cambridge, drawn probably by the great 
fame of Erasmus. After leaving the University, he was ordained, and became a friar 
in the monastery at Greenwich. He is next found engaged as chaplain and private 
tutor to Sir John Welcli in Gloucestershire. While living with Sir John, disputes 
often arose between Tyndale and other clergymen who frequented the house, and 
Tyndale sometimes pressed his opponents closely on account of their want of famili- 
arity with the Scriptures; and on one occasion he ended his argument with this mem- 
orable saying : " If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause the boy that driveth 



THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 117 

the plough to know more of the Scriptures thau you do." Tyndale evidently had 
early formed the distinct design of making an English translation of the Scriptures, 
and this design became henceforward the ruling purpose of his life. 

The WnvTt, Executed Abroad. — In the execution of his plan Tyndale found it 
necessary to go abroad. Tiiere were at that time resident, at various cities on the 
continent, English merchants, men of wealth and influence, who, together with those 
of their own class at home, were generally favorable to the doctrines of the reforma- 
tion. The commercial intercourse between these merchants and their friends in Eng- 
land gave to Luther and his associates a channel of communication and influence 
against which Henry and his ministers strove in vain. Tyndale resolved, therefore, 
to go abroad to some place where even the long arm of the Government might not 
reach him ; and there, making and printing his translation without molestation, 
trust to these pious merchants for its difi"usion in England. Accordingly, in 1523, 
he le:t England never to return, and during the ensuing thirteen years devoted him- 
self, day and night, to the work to which he had consecrated his life. 

Progress of the Work. —The New Testament was first printed in 
1525. Tyndale then proceeded with the Old Testament, and had com- 
pleted the larger portion of it, when death put an end to his labors. 
He also made, in 1534, a careful revision of his New Testament, 

Final Result. — Edition after edition of Tjndale's books found their 
way into England, notwithstanding all the efforts of Henry and his 
ministers to prevent it. The Government succeeded at length in 
inducing the authorities of the city of Brussels to arrest and imprison 
the translator, and finall}^ to put him to death. He was burnt at the 
stake at Tilford, near Brussels, in 1536, his dying exclamation being, 
" Lord, open the King of England's eyes ! " 

Chnracfer of the Translation. — The chief characteristics of Tyndale's Version 
are these : 1. He translated directly from the Greek and Hebrew originals, not from 
the Latin Vulgate. Tyndale did not, avowedly at least, make use of Wycklilfe's Ver- 
sion, yet the influence of that Version is often manifest in the forms of expression 
used. This was probably only the unconscious influence of a work which had afl'ected 
so largely the religious thought and language of the race. 2. Tyndale adopted pur- 
posely the words and idioms of the common people, avoiding what were then called 
"ink-horn phrases," that is, modes of expression taken from books and men of 
learning, and not suited to the understanding of plain, unlettered people. This feature 
lias been to a great extent perpetuated in our common version, and is one of its lead- 
ing excellencies. 3. Tyndale translated what are called the "ecclesiastical words." The 
Catholics and some of the Reformers maintained that, in the history of the Church, 
through a long succession of ages, certain associations of a valufTble kind were con- 
noeted with these woi-ds ; that they had acquired by long use a certain well-defined 
meaning; and that in translating the Scriptures into any modern language, these 
'•ecclesiastical words," instead of being translated, should be tnuist'crtcil. with only 
such changes of spelling as might bo necessary. Tyndale, om the ccnfniry. hold that 
every word, the meaning of which was known, should l)e litoally translated. Accord- 
ingly, for "grace" he said favor, for "penance" repentance, for "church" congrega- 
tion, for "priests" seniors or elders, for ''bishops" overseers, for "confessing" ac- 
knowledging, for "chalice" cup, and so on. 



118 ENGLISH LITEEATURE. 

3. Coverdale's Version. 

Miles Coverdale, 1487-1568, has the distinguished honor 
of being the first to give his countrymen the whole printed 
Bible in English. Coverdale's Bible was first printed on the 
Continent, in 1535. 

History of the Version. — There are some doubts as to the true history of Cov- 
erdale's version. The latest conjecture is the following: This version is supposed to 
have been made at the suggestion and under the direction of Cromwell. This states- 
man, after the downfall of Wolsey and More, had more than any other man in England 
the confidence of Henry VIII., and finally succeeded in persuading him that the 
translation and circulation of the Scriptures in the English tongue, provided the 
translation was properly made, would strengthen, instead of weakening, the King's 
supremacy. Henry, accordingly, who had caused Tyndale to be put to death, is found 
not long after actually authorizing, and aiding in, that very work for which Tyndale 
had laid down his life. In the anticipation of such a change of policy, Coverdale, at 
the suggestion, it is supposed, of Cromwell, went to the continent and there engaged 
privately in the work of preparing his version. The work when completed was dedi- 
cated to the King, and two years later it was reprinted in England, without the oppo- 
sition, though not with the express license of the government. 

Character of the Version. — Coverdale's version, though by no means 
equal to Tyndale' s, has considerable merit. In regard to the " eccle- 
siastical words," he pursued .a middle and a vacillating course, some- 
times translating, and sometimes transferring them. The work was 
evidently shaped with a view to propitiate the King, and to secure for 
it, not only acquiescence, but the royal license. It was translated, not 
from the originals, but from the Dutch and the Latin, 

Note. — This last statement has been controverted. But Coverdale says, expressly, 
in his title-page, that the woi'k is " translated out of the Douche and Latyney By 
"Douche" (Dutch) we are to understand the High-Dutch, or German; and the 
latest investigation shows that he followed two German vereions, Luther's, of the old 
text, prior to 1534, and the Zurich, of 1530. The typography, in fact, shows that Cov- 
erdale's Bible was printed at the same press as the Zurich Bible of 1530. The "Latin" 
texts used by CJoverdale were the Vulgate, Pagnini's, and the Latin New Testament 
of Erasmus. 

4. Matthew's Version. 

The Bible known as Matthew's was the first version in 
English that was regularly authorized by the King. It ap- 
peared in folio, in 1537, two years after that of Coverdale. 

The Real Author, — It has been pretty well ascertained that the name 
Thomas Matthew, affixed to this version, is a fiction. The real author 
was John Eogers, commonly known as the " proto-martyr." 

Histori/ of the WorJc. — Rogers was a convert of Tyndale's, and had been asso- 
ciated with him in the work of translation. When Tyndale was put to death, Rogers 



THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 119 

continued and completed the work on which tliey had been laboring together. The 
printing was begun on the continent, but finding the time propitious and the King 
now wholly favorable to the enterprise, two famous English printers, Grafton andWhite- 
church, undertook the completion of it in England; and, through the intervention ^f 
Cranmer and Cromwell, obtained not only an express license to print, but a monoi)oly 
of the printing for five years, and a royal order that a copy of this Bible should be set 
up in every church in the kingdom. As the name of Rogers was associated with that 
of Tyndale, and might have raised opposition in the mind of the King, the printers, 
in presenting the book for licensure, put in the title-page the convenient fiction of 
Thomas Matthew. Siich is the now commonly received opinion. The work in every 
jiart bears the strongest internal evidence of being in the main that of Tyndale, sup- 
plemented by his friend and disciple, John Rogers. 

Taverner's Bible. — In 1539, two years after the publication of Matthew's Bible, a 
revision of it appeared, executed by Richard Taverner. Taverner's work, however, 
is not to be considered as a separate version, though sometimes so represented. 

5. The Great Bible. 

The version known as The Great Bible first appeared in 
1539. It was not a mere reprint of a previous version, but 
had features of its own, giving it an original and independent 
character. 

In the following year, 1540, this Bible, "without noticeable alteration, 
was reprinted, with a prologue by Cranmer. In this form, it is called, 
sometimes. The Great Bible, sometimes Cranmer's Bible. 

Used in the Prayer-Book. — Cranmer's Bible was the Authorized 
Version of the English Church, fi-om 1540 to 1568 (excepting the in- 
terval of Mary's reign). The Psalms and most of the other portions of 
Scripture found in the Prayer-Book were taken from Cranmer's version, 
that being the one in use when the Prayer-Book was compiled. 

Character. — Cranmer's Bible was a stately folio, and was intended 
especially for use in churches. All churches and religious houses were 
required to have copies of it ; and no less than six large editions of it 
were printed in 1540 and 1541. 

6. The Geneva Version. 

The English Protestants resident at Geneva brought out 
in that city an English version of the Scriptures in 1560. 
This version is generally known as The Geneva Bible. 



120 ENGLISH LITEKATURE. 

Origin of the Geneva Version. — The English refugees at Geneva 
were mostly Presbyterians. They were dissatisfied with Cranmer's 
Bible, partly on account of its expensiveness, which put it beyond the 
reach of common people, but chiefly on account of its supposed lean- 
ing towards Episcopacy. A project to make a new version on the basis 
of Tyndale's, but with such improvements as the intervening period 
had suggested, was entertained during the short reign of Edward VI., 
while the Presbyterians were in power, and under the same influences 
that originated the Westminster Assembly of Divines. But the early 
death of Edward interrupted the project, and put an end to it as a 
national aftair. It was, however, resumed in Geneva as a private en- 
terprise, and brought to completion in 1560. 

The Translators. — The men by whom mainly this version was exe- 
cuted were William Whittingham, Anthony Gilby, and Thomas Samp- 
son. Some others, as Coverdale, Goodman, Pullain, Cole, Bodieigh, 
and possibly Knox, helped in the matter. But the main work was 
done by the three first named, and more by Whittingham than by any 
other one. The whole of the New Testamept was by Whittingham. 

JVliittinghatn. — Vniliam Whittingham, 1524-1589, was of a good family near 
Durham ; was educated at Oxford; married a sister of John Calvin ; succeeded Knox 
as pastor of the English refugees at Geneva ; and was evidently the main author of 
the Geneva Version of the Bible. On the death of Mary, when the other refugees at 
Geneva returned at pnce to England, Anthony Wood states expressly that " AVhitting- 
ham, with one or two more, did tarry at Geneva a year and a half after Queen Eliza- 
beth came to the crown, being resolved to go through ivitli the work." Whittingham re- 
turned to England on completing the printing at Geneva. He became afterwards 
Dean of Durham. 

JPninilaritif . — The Geneva Version was, for the next sixty years, altogether the 
most popular version in England. No less than eighty editions of it were printed be- 
tween 1560 and 1611, the time of the publication of the version made by order of King 
James. The Geneva Version even kept its ground for some considerable time after 
that event, and gave way only by slow degrees. 

Why Popular. — Some of the reasons for this popularity Avere the following: 
1. The translation was in itself, in many respects, an excellent one. 2. It was, like 
Tyndale's, comparatively free from " ink-horn phrases," and suited to popular reading. 
3. It was, in all its editions, in a smaller and cheai)er volume than the " Great Bible " 
of Cranmer. 4. It was the first English Bible that laid aside the obsolescent old black 
letter, and appeared in the common Roman type. 5. It was the first English Bil^le 
in which the text was broken up, as at present, into verses. As preachers then were, 
much more than now, in the habit of referring to chapter and verse, and the people 
also were in the habit of following them by turning to the passages quoted, the Geneva 
Bible gave special facilities for such a purpose, and was prized accordingly. 6, and 
lastly, the " Notes," explanatory and homiletical, which accompanied the text, 
were highly esteemed, and added greatly to its value in the eyes of the common 
people. 



THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 121 

7. The Bishops' Bible. 

Another version, or revision, commonly known as The 
Bishops' Bible, was projected by Archbishop Parker, and 
brought to completion in 1568. 

History. — The work was parcelled out by the Archbishop to fifteen 
men having special eminence as Greek and Hebrew scholars, the re- 
sult of their labors being revised by the Archbishop himself. As a 
majority of the translators were Bishops, the version obtained the 
name of The Bishops' Bible. 

Character. — The version was made on the basis of Cranmer's, and 
was executed in a creditable manner ; and it contained, as all admit, 
some valuable improvements. Yet it made little headway against the 
Geneva version, and did not even entirely displace Cranmer's. 

8. The Rheims-Douay Version. 

The English version of the Bible in use among Catholics 
was made in the reign of Queen Elizabeth by Catholic refu- 
gees living at Kheims, in France, in 1582. 

When Printed. — The translation appears to have been completed in 
1582, but it was not all then printed. The New Testament was printed 
at Rheims, in 1582, and the Old Testament at Douay, in 1609. The 
work is sometimes called the Rheims-Douay Version, and sometimes 
simply The Douay Version. 

JSistory, — Rheims and Douay were, in some respects, to English Catholics in the 
days of Elizabeth, what Geneva had been to English Protestants in the days of Mary. 
It was by the expatriated English Catholics that the Rheims-Douay Version of the 
Bible was mada, The leader in the work was Williarq Allen, commonly known as 
Cardinal Allen, though it is doubted whether much of the actual work of translation 
was done by him. His chief coadjutors were Gregory Martin, Richard Bristow, and 
Thomas Worthington. Martin, in fact, is believed to have been the main author of 
the version, holding about the same relation to it that Whittingham did to the Geneva 
Version. 

Character.— The Rheims-Douay Version is made directly from the Vulgate. The 
only English version which seems to have had any material influence upon the 
Rhemish translators was that of Wyckliffe, whose version naturally had attractions 
for them, as being itself also made from the A'^ulgate, and as being by its age already 
removed somewhat from the controversies of the day. The translators give abundant 
evidence of scholarship, and many of their renderings challenge admiration. Their 
diction is at times just sufficiently archaic to give a venerable air to their work; and 
they retain aome fine old English words and phrases which have now unfortunately 
gone out of general iiise. On the other hand they are extremely literal, translating 
11 



122 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

word for word, and maintaniing even the Latin order of the words, and they retain 
with scrupulous care, and on principle, all the old "ecclesiastical words," going, in 
this respect, far bej^ond the Bishops' Eible and Cranmer's, andto the opposite extreme 
from Tyndale's and the Geneva Bible. They also give numerous expository notes, fol- 
lowing in this respect the example of all the previous versions, and especially that 
executed at Geneva. 

Challoner's Eevision. — About tlie middle of the last century, Bishop 
Challoner, noticed elsewhere in this volume, made ^ careful revision 
of the Eheims-Douay Version, amounting almost to a new version. 
Challoner's work consisted mainly in abandoning that extreme literal- 
ness which marked the version originally, and in modernizing, to some 
extent, its archaic diction, and bringing its expressions more within 
the scope of current modern English. The first edition of it is dated 
1750. 

Authorization. — It being left to the Bishop of each diocese to deter- 
mine what version of the Scriptures shall be used in that diocese, there 
has not been the same uniformity in this respect among Catholics as 
among Protestants. In the main, however, Challoner's revision has 
been the one adopted since his time. 

9. King James's Version. 

The English version of the Bible in common use among 
Protestants, and generally known as The Authorized Ver- 
sion, was made 1611, in the reign of James I. 

Origin of the Version. — One of the earliest acts of James, after com- 
ing to the throne of England, was to invite several of the leaders of the 
Episcopal and the Presbyterian parties to meet him at his royal resi- 
dence at Hampton Court, with a view of mediating between them. 
This meeting has become famous in history, and is known as the 
Hampton Court Conference. At this Conference, Dr. John Eainolds 
suggested, among other things, the propriety of makitig a new version 
of the Scriptures. The idea pleased the vanity of James, who believed 
himself a great scholar, and who was flattered with the idea of being 
the patron of a great literary undertaking, such as this promised to be. 

The Translators, — The King's plan Avas to appoint fifty-four trans- 
lators, divided into six companies, of which two companies were to be 
settled at Oxford, two at Cambridge, and two at Westminster, and to 
each company a certain portion of the Scriptures was assigned for 
translation. The original plan contemplated fifty-four translators, 
although only forty-seven were actually appointed. 



i 



THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 123 

History of the Work. — The plan was promulgated and the transla- 
tors were designated in 1604. The work of actual translation, how- 
ever, did not begin until 1607. Three years of continuous labor were 
then spent by the several companies in completing the particular part 
assigned to each. Three-fourtlis of a year were afterwards spent in 
revising the whoie by a joint committee of revision, consisting of two 
delegates from each company. This committee having gone over the 
whole and settled the text, it was put into the hands of two, Bishop 
Bilson on behalf of the Bishops, and Dr. Miles Smith on behalf of the 
Translators, to attend to the printing. The work was completed in 
1611. 

Popularity. — The new version soon displaced all other Protestant 
versions, even the Geneva gradually giving way to it ; and from that 
time to the present it has been the translation in common use among 
all English Protestants. 

Character of the Translators. — The men engaged in this work were taken 
mostly from the Universities, and were among the most conspicuous scholars of their 
day. Nearly all the translators had received Fellowships in one or the other of the 
Universities. Thirteen of them were men eminent for skill in the Hebrew and other 
oriental languages, including six who were or had been Hebrew Professors in the 
Universities. Fifteen were, or had been, Heads of Colleges, five Tice-Chancelloi'S, 
three Greek Professors, seven Divinity Professors, seven Bishops, and one Archbishop. 
Both the religious parties were represented, — the friends of the Bishops' Bible, and 
the friends of the Geneva Bible; and, in the allotment of the work, the special attain- 
ments and tastes of each translator were considered. 

Utiles. — A code of rules was drawn up fir the guidance of the translators, the 
most important of which was that no notes or comments were to be added. These 
" Notes " had formed a conspicuous feature in all the previous versions, particularly 
Tyndale's and the Geneva. These notes were now expressly forbidden, and the pro- 
hibition was carefully observed. Two other regulations were that the Bishops' Bible 
v,-as to be made the basis, and that the old ecclesiastical words were to be kept. These 
rules were less rigorously observed, the translators taking a middle course. Only a 
few of the ecclesiastical words were retained, and the version as a whole comes nearer 
to that of Tyndale than to any other. It shows marks also of the influence of the 
Rheims-Douay Version, and, through it, of Wyckliffe's, although neither of them was 
among the versions which the translators were commanded to consult. 

Its Popularity. — No version of the Scriptures in any language ever 
enjoyed a greater popularity than King James's. Its literary charac- 
ter especially has received the highest commendation. There is, in 
the language, no work of equal value as a specimen of English. Cath- 
olic and Protestant alike have recognized its value in this respect. 

" Who will say that the uncommon beauty and marvellous English of the Protestant 
Bible is not one of the strongholds of heresy in this country? It lives on the ear like 
a music thatcau never be forgotten, like the sound of church-bells, which the convert 



124 ENGLISH LITERATUEE. 

hardly knows how he can forego. Its felicities often seem to be almost things rather 
than mere words. It is part ot the national mind, and the anchor of national serious- 
ness. Nay, it is worshipped with a positive idolatry, in extenuation of whose gro- 
tesque fanaticism its intrinsic beauty pleads availingly with the man of letters and 
the scholar. The memory of the dead passes into it. The potent traditions of child- 
hood are stereotyped in its phrases. Tlie power of all the griefs and trials of a man is 
hidden beneath its words. It is the representative of his best moments; and all that 
there has been about him of soft, and gentle, and pure, and penitent, and good, speaks 
to him forever out of his English Bible. It is his sacred tiling, which doubt has never 
dimmed and controversy never soiled. It has been to him all along as the silent, but 
oh, how intelligible voice of his guardian angel : and in the length and breadth of the 
land there is not a Protestant, with one spark of religiousness about him, whose 
spiritual biography is not in his Saxon Bible." — F. W. Faber, quoted with commen- 
dation in the Dublin Review, June, 1853, (Catholic.) 

" The peculiar genius, if such a word may be permitted, which breathes through it, 
the mingled tenderness and majesty, the Saxon simplicity, the preternatural gran- 
deur, unequalled, unapproached, in the attempted improvements of modern scholars, 
— all are here, and bear the impress of the mind of one man, and that man William 
Tyndale." — J. A. Froude, Hist. Eng. (Protestant.) 



II. THE ENGLISH PRAYER-BOOK. 

Another of the great treasures of English literature is the 
Book of Common Prayer according to the Use of the Church 
of England. As a specimen of English it is unequalled by 
anything that the language contains, except the English 
Version of the Bible. 

Its High Rank. — When we consider the influence which the con- 
tinual and reverent use of such a book, for more than ten generations, 
must have had upon the language, the opinions, the feehngs, and the 
conduct of a great people, it is impossible not to concede that it holds 
a foremost rank among the treasures of the language. 

A Growth, rather than a Work. — Like the English Version of the 
Bible, the Book of Common Prayer was not the work of any one man, 
or set of men, nor was it produced at one time, but was rather a slow 
and silent growth — the work of many noble minds through successive 



Earlier Forms. — The greater part of the substance of this book existed pre- 
viously in Latin, and is traceable to a remote antiquity. It is with its English dress 
only that the present treatise is concerned. Some portions of the service had been 
translated into English for the use of the people one hundred and fifty years at least 
before the preparation of the Prayer-Book in its present form. This earlier book of 
service, existing with variations in different dioceses, and under different reigns, but 
having a substantial uniformity, was called The Prymer. 



THE ENGLISH PEAYER-BOOK. 125 

The PrynieT. — Some obscurity rests upon the history of this book. It is referred 
to familiarly iii the records of tlie time, as something generally known, jnst as we 
now refer to the Prayer-iiook. It is mentioned as Tlie Prymer in English, The Prymer 
both in English and Latin, This Prymer of Salisbury Use, and often simply as The 
Prymer. Thus the Duchess of Gloucester, in her will, 1399, leaves to her daughter "a 
book with the Psalter, Prymer, and other devotions; " and the author of Piers Plow- 
man, not later certainly than 1365, says : 

" The lomes [looms] that ich labor with, 

And lyfode [livelihood] deserve, 

Ys Pater Noster and my Prymer.'' 

Origin of the Pri/tner. — It is highly probable that the word was originally 
derived from some small manuals, which were spread among the people, of the first 
and chief lessons of religious belief and practice. These may have been so called, not 
only because they were the lessons of children, but because they were equally necessary 
for all men to learn. Springing from some such early manuals, of things necessary 
for all men to know and to do, the Prymer passed on from age to age, gradually col- 
lecting, now an office, and then a prayer, at one time the penitential psalms, at another 
the litany, at another the dirge, until at last it arrived at the state in which, with little 
further alteration, it remained during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, — always 
a known book, authorized by the Church, and familiar to the people. 

JExtant Co2>ies. — According to Maskell (Monumenta Ritualia, Vol. 2: xxxv.), 
there are only eight manuscript copies extant of the old English Prymer, two of 
which were in his possession, and have since become- the property of the British 
Museum. One of these, the oldest and most perfect, is determined by internal evi- 
dence to be not later than 1410, and it probably is somewhat earlier. Procter assigns 
it to the year 1400, and Blunt calls it "The Prymer of the Fourteenth Century." Mr. 
Maskell carefully printed this Prymer from the original manuscript then in his pos- 
session. The extracts which will be given are taken from Maskell. 

Contents of the JPri/mer. — This old English Prymer contains the Creed, the 
Lord's Prayer, the Ten Commandments, the Litany, and many other equally familiar 
portions of the present service. 

The Prymer clearly formed the basis for a large part of 
the present Prayer-Book. 

]^OTE. — The New England Primer, of the early colonial times, con- 
taining the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, the Shorter Catechism of the 
Westminster Assembly of Divines, and sundry other brief summaries 
of doctrine and forms of devotion, seems to have been a far-off echo of 
this old English Prymer of the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth 
centuries. 

The English Reformers, in preparing the Book of Com- 
mon Prayer, had two things especially in view, first to have 
the service entirely in English, and secondly to have it uni- 
form in all parts of the kingdom, instead of having, as be- 
fore, different service-books in the different dioceses. 
11* 



126 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

Tlie First Step. — A Committee of Convocation was appointed for this purpose in 
1542, under the sanction of Henry Till. The committee made some progress in the 
work, but were prevented by the jealousy of the King from carrying it to completion. 

The Prayer-Book of 1549. — On the accession of Edward VI. the sub- 
ject was revived, and a new Commission was appointed, consisting of 
Archbishop Cranmer, six Bishops, and six clergy of the Lower House 
of Convocation. This commission proceeded with due deliberation, 
and having completed their labors, presented the Book of Common 
Prayer to the King, to be by him laid before Parliament. The book, 
after some discussion, was accej)ted by Parliament, and an Act of Uni- 
formity was passed, making its use obligatory. This book, first issued 
in 1549, is called The First Prayer-Book of Edward VI. 

The Prayer-Book of 1652. — In the following year another commis- 
sion was appointed by the King, consisting of Cranmer and a number 
of divines, to give a revision of the first book. This revision was some 
time in hand. The Archbishop and his coadjutors are reported from 
time to time as at work upon it. The book, as revised by them, was 
reported to Parliament, adopted, and issued, in 1552, and is known as 
The Second Prayer-Book of Edward VI. 

During the succeeding reign, that of Mary, this book, of course, was laid aside. 

The Prayer-Book of 1559. — On the accession of Elizabeth, when the 
reformed religion was reinstated, the Prayer-Book was subject to a 
further and final revision, and was adopted in its present form in 1559. 
There was, however, an additional collection of Prayers and Thanks- 
givings upon Several Occasions, appended to the Morning and Even- 
ing Prayer, in 1662. 

The General Result. — From this slight sketch of its history, it will 
be seen that the English Book of Common Prayer was formed in the 
main out of materials previously existing, partly in English, partly in 
Latin, in the service-books of the various dioceses, many of them trace- 
able to a remote antiquity ; that, as before stated, it was not the work 
of any one man, or set of men, though, as will presently be shown, 
traces of particular workmen may be found here and there, but was 
the slow and steady outgrowth of time, as it is a noble expression of a 
great. God-fearing race. 

Authorship. — Of the clear traces which exist of the part performed 
by particular workmen in this time-honored edifice, the following facts 
are of interest. 

The Prayer "For All Conditions of Men " was composed by Peter Gunning, D. D., 
1613-1684, Master of Corpus Christi, and Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Cam- 
bridge, and afterwards Bishop successively of Chichester and Ely. 



THE EXGLISH PEAYE E-BOOK. 127 

The first of the Ember Collects, for those who are about to be admitted to Holy 
Orders, is supposed to be the composition ol John Cosin, D. D., Master of Peterhouse, 
Cambridge, afterwards Bishop of Durham, noticed elsewhere in this volume. 

The Prayer for the High Court of Parliament was composed by Archbishop Laiid. 

TSie General Thanksgiving was composed or compiled by Edward Reynolds, D. D., 
Vice Chancellor of Oxford, and afterwards Bishop of Norwich, noticed elsewhere in 
this volume. 

The Litany. — In regard to the composition of the Litany, the most impressive 
part, perhaps, of the whole book, no complete information exists. The outline of such 
•A service is found in the Latin service-books and the Frymer already mentioned. But 
the Litany, as it now stands, besides being a noble rendering of such portions of the 
old litanies as were retained, contains a large portion, nearly one-half, of matter not 
found in any of the old service-books used in England. This new portion in part 
originated with the compilers, and in part was adopted by thera from the Latin Litany 
prepared by Luther. Among the new petitions introduced in the Litany is that be- 
ginning with the words, "That it may please Thee to give to all thy people increase 
of grace," etc., and the three petitions immediately following it. That most touching 
petition, " That it may please thee to defend and provide for the fatherless children 
and widows, and all that are desolate and oppressed,'' and the two equally beautiful 
petitions immediately following it, are taken from Luther.* 

Improvetnents upon the Older Versions. — As evidence of the kind of lit- 
erary work performed by the compilers, in the case of those prayers which bad already 
been translated into early English, the reader may compare the present Collect at 
Evening Prayer, "0 God, from whom all holy desires, ail good counsels, and all just 
works do proceed," etc., with the form of the Prymer Version of the same in the copy 
in the possession of Mr. Maskell, " God, of whom ben hooli desiris, rigt councels, and 
just werkis, gyve to thy servantis pees that the world may not geve, that in oure 
hertis gouun to thi coramaundementis, and the drede of enemyes putt awei, oure 
tymes be pesible thurg tlii defendyng. Bi oure lord jesu crist, thi sone, that with thee 
lyveth and regueth in the unite of the hooly goost god, bi alle worldis of worldis. So 
be it." 

The Creed. — The Creed, as given in the old Prymer. is in these words : "I bileve 
in god, fadir almygti, makere of he vene and of erthe ; and in jesu crist the sone of him, 
oure lord, oon aloone; which is lonceyved of the hooli gost : born of marie maiden; 
suffride passioun undir pounce pilat ; crucified, deed, and biried , he wente doun to hellis ; 
the thridde day he roos agen fro deede ; he steig to hevenes : he sittith on the rigt 
syde of god the fadir almygti : thenus he is to come for to deme the quyke and deede. 
I bileve in the hooli goost; feith of hooli chirche; comunynge of seyntis ; forgyve- 
nesse of synnes ; agenrising of fleish, and everlastinge Ij-f. So be it." 

Tlie Lord's Prayer. — The Prymer version of the Lord's Prayer is as follows : 
" Oure fadir, that art in hevenes, halewid be thi name: thy rewme come to thee ; be 
thi wille do as in hevene and in erthe; oure eche dales breed gjve us to day : nnd for- 
gyve us our dettis, as and we ftrgeven to oure dettouris; and ne lede us into tempta- 
cioun ; but delyvere us fro yvel. So be it." 

The Prayer of St. Chrysostotn. — The b'-autiful Prayer of St. Chrysostoni. at 

* "Ut pupillos et viduas protegere et providere digneris ; 
"Ut cunctis hominibus misereri digneris ; 

'•Tjthostibus, persecutoribus, et calumniatoribus nostris ignoscere, et eos convertere 
digneris."— iwt/ter. 



128 EXGLISH LITERATURE. 

the close of the Morning and Evening Service, was ilrst brought into use, in modem 
European M-orks of devotion, by Cranmer and his coadjutors in the preliminary re- 
vision of 1544. The translation is a masterpiece of composition, as any scholar may 
see at a glance, who will take the trouble to compare it with the original.* 

TJhe Te Deum. — Like skill is shown in the rendering of the venerable Latin 
hymn known as the Te Deum. "What words could express more appropriately or more 
beautifully the force of the original, than is done in such words and phrases as the 
following: 

...proclamant, ...do cry aloud. 

Per singulos dies benedicimus te, Day by day we magnify thee. 

Judex crederis esse venturus, Ti e believe that thcu slialt come to be our judge. 

Tu devicto aculeo mortis, When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death. 

Prophetarum laudabilis numerus, The goodly fellowship of the prophets. 

III. THE SHORTER CATECHISM. 

Another document worthy of mention among the literary 
treasures of the language is The Shorter Catechism pre- 
pared by the Assembly of Divines who met at Westminster 
in 1643. 

The Westminster Assembly. — This famous Assembly was nearly 
six years in session, having been convened July 1, 1643, and having 
adjourned finally February 22, 1649. It contained many of the choicest 
spirits of the Presbyterian element in both England and Scotland. 

Works of the Assembly. — AH the documents ^hich they put forth. 
The Solemn League and Covenant, The Confession of Faith, The 
Directory for Public Worship, The Form of Church Government and 
Discipline, and The Catechisms, are remarkable as mere literary pro- 
ductions. But none of them are to be compared in this respect with 
that known as The Shorter Catechism, 

As a mere specimen of exact verbal expression, there 
probably has been nothing superior to the Shorter Catechism 
since the days of Aristotle. 

Its Position. — To the entire body of English-speaking Presbyterians 
all over the world, and to the great majority of CongregationaKsts also, 
this wonderful summary of Christian doctrine has formed a part of the 
household treasures of the race. By long-established custom it has 

•'■'O TO.; Kotva? TavTa<; Ka\ crvixdtMVOV^ Vf^^'^ \a.pL(T6.ixevo<; —porrevxaq, 6 Koi Svo kcu 
Tpicrl avixSiorovaiv iiri tw ovofxaTi crov TcLg atTTjo-ei? —apix^LV e—ayyeLXafxevos' avroj 
KaL vvv Tuov SovAcui' aov ra. aiTrjfxara. Trpib? rb <rv)x<i>ipov rrkripuicrov, -^(wpriyiov ijfJ.iv ei- Ta> 
TTapovTi atwu. rrji/ eniyvixiaiv (tt)<; a.krj9eia<;, Ka'i kv tim p.iXXoi'Ti ^wtjv aldiviov xa.piC^ofx^vo';, 



THE SHOETER CATECHISM. 129 

from earlv years been lodged in the memory of nearly every Presby- 
terian child ; it is associated, in the minds of Presbyterians, with deeds 
of heroic daring and patience, which make it dear to the heart. There 
can be little fear of mistake, therefore, in placing this Shorter Cate- 
chism of the Westminster Assembly among the literary treasures of 
the language. 

Influence. — The inHuence of this Catechism upon the opinions, the 
conduct, the language, the modes of thought and expression, of those 
who have received it, is beyond that of any other uninspired book 
which the literature of the race contains. 

The Authoi'ship. — Of the composition of this Catechism there is no distinct 
record. It was the last document reported by the Assembly, containing in small 
compass the perfected fruit of their long deliberation. As it covers the same ground 
as the Confession of Faith, the presumption is that it was the work of the same Com- 
mittee, which included several of the ablest men in the Assembly. 

A Tradition. — There is an ipteresting tradition in regard to one memorable 
answer in the Catechism. The important and difficult question, What is God? was 
assigned to Gillespie of Edinburgh, a man comparatively young, but noted in the 
Assembly for his gravity of character, as well as for his intellectual power. Feeling 
the seriousness of the occasion. Gillespie asked the Assembly to join him in prayer for- 
Divine guidance, and began his prayer with these words : "0 God, who art a Spirit, 
infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in thy being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, 

goodness, and truth ." The Assembly had their answer. The very words of this 

solemn invocation, as if inspired by the Spirit himself whom they invoked. Were 
forthwith adopted by the Assembly, and have since formed the answer of all Presby- 
terians to the grave qiiestion. What is God? God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and un- 
changeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. 

TJie Questions Otnitted. — It is worthy of note, in regard to this Catechism, 
that if the Questions are omitted, the Answers, taken by themselves, form a contin- 
uous statement, like a chain of closely dependent propositions in Euclid. It has been 
conjectured that the work was original!}' composed in this form, and afterwards 
broken up into Question and .\nswer. Any intelligent reader, who will make the ex- 
periment of writing out a few of the answers, one after the other, without the inter- 
vening questions, will be struck M'ith the close logical order and dependence of the 
whole, and with its perfection as a verbal expression of thouglit. 

As a system of doctrine, this Catechism has of course its 
opponents. But as a model of expression, and as a specimen 
of standard English, in which character alone it has a place 
in the present volume, it has defied criticism. 

IV. ENOLISH HYMNODY. 

The religious Reformation of the sixteenth century has 
given a wonderful development to a particular form of lyric 

I 



130 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

poetry, Psalms and Hymns, in the two races, English and 
German, chiefly affected by that movement. 

Note. — Psalms and Hymns are not new in rehgious worship. 
They have been used by the Christian Church in all ages, and in 
heathen as well as in Christian worship. But the particular form of 
the Psalms and Hymns now in use originated with the Reformation. 

Mediaeval Hymns. — Church music, in the mediaeval times, was 
something belonging to the choir, not to the congregation. The 
choral Hymns were in Latin, and many of them were surpassingly 
beautiful. Any one who has seen even a picture of the interior of an 
old cathedral, and has some general idea of its arrangements, can 
readily imagine the pomp and magnificence of the choral music. 
Milton has given expression to the teeling which this feature of the 
old cathedral worship was suited to awaken, in those familiar lines : 

"But let my due feet never fail 
To walk the studious cloisters pale, 
And love the high-embowed roof, 
With antique pillars massy proof, 
And storied windows richly dight, 
Casting a dim religious light : 
There let the pealing organ blow 
To the full-voiced choir below, 
In service high and anthems clear, 
As may with sweetness, through mine ear. 
Dissolve me into ecstacies, 
And bring all heaven before mine eyes." 

The Change. — A leading idea with the Reformers, both in England 
and on the continent, was to simplify religious worship, and to give to 
the laity a more active participation in it. Instead, therefore, of the 
elaborate and multiplied forms of the old established ritual, the Prot- 
estant churches adopted a service of a much simpler character, and 
this always included, of course, the church music. The well-trained 
choir and the lofty anthem, the old liturgic hymn, and the antiphonal 
chant, 

" The notes, with many a winding bout 

Of linked sweetness long drawn out. 

With wanton heed and giddy cunning; 

The melting voice through mazes running, 

Untwisting all the chains that tie 

The hidden soul of harmony," 



ENGLISH HYMNODY. 131 

gave way, to a great extent, to hymns in the vernacular, set to the 
simplest strains, and sung by the whole congregation. 

How Brought About. — This change, first made by Luther, was fol- 
lowed up by Calvin, and from him found its way into England through 
the English exiles living at Geneva, Calvin found facilities for mak- 
ing the change in Geneva, in a curious incident which happened just 
then in France. 

Marot's J^salms, — Clement Marot,* a valet of the bedchamber to Francis I., 
was in his day the favorite poet of France, and embellished, in various ways, the French 
poetry, wliich had been hitherto little cultivated. He distinguished himself by ron- 
deaux, madrigals, pastomls, ballads, fables, elegies, epitaphs, and poetical versions 
from the Italian and the Latin. At length, tired of the vanities of profane poetry, he 
conceived the idea of translating the Psalms of David into French rhymes. As his 
project was not connected with any intended innovation in public worship, and was 
of a sentimental rather than of a religious character, it received the assistance of the 
Professor of Hebrew in the University, and the sanction of the Sorbonne ; and the 
Psalms, or Songs, were dedicated by permission to Francis I., and to the ladies of 
France. In his dedication to the ladies, wlmm he had so often addressed in the tender 
phrases of passion and of compliment, Marot seems anxious to deprecate the railler}'' 
which his new kind of verses was likely to incur. In a spirit of religious gallantry he 
declares that his design is to add to the happiness of his fair readers, by giving them 
divine hymns instead of love-songs ; to inspire their susceptible hearts with a passion 
in which there is no torment : to banish that fickle and fantastic deity Cupid from the 
world, and to fill their apartments with the praises, .not of "the little god," but of the 
true Jehovah. The golden age, he says, would then soon be restored. We should see 
the peasant at his plough, the carman in the streets, and the mechanic in his shop, 
solacing their toils with psalms and canticles ; and the shepherds and shepherdesses 
reposing in the shade, and teaching the rocks to echo the name of the Creator. 

Marot's Psalms soon eclipsed his madrigals and sonnets. Psalm-singing became the 
general mode of domestic merriment. It was the common accompaniment to the 
fiddle. In the splendid and festive Court of Francis I., of a sudden, nothing was heard 
but the new Psalms. 

Psalm- Singinrf in Geneva. — The sagacious mind of Calvin turned to account 
this new fashion. Perceiving in it the means of carrying into effect his preconceived 
scheme, and of immediately popularizing, as well as simplifying, the church music, he 
forthwith introduced the Psalms of Marot into the congregation at Geneva. Being set 
to very simple airs, in which the whole congregation could join, they were soon estab- 
lished as a regular branch of the Genevan worship, and formed an appendix to the 
Genevan Catechism. 

Psalm-Singing in England. — The Eeformers in England followed 
the example of their continental brethren. It is not a little singular, 
too, that the first version of the Psalter, used in public worship, to be 
sung by the whole congregation, was made in English, as in French, 
by a layman, a courtier, and a court-poet. I refer to Thomas Stern- 
hold. Wyatt and Surrey had both made metrical versions of particu- 

*See Warton's English Poetry, Vol. III., pp. 142-157. 



132 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

lar Psalms. Coverdale, the Bible translator, published, as early as 
1539, forty " Ghostly Psalms and Spiritual Songs." But Sternhold's 
Psalms were the first used in public worship. 

Sternhold and Hopkins. 

The first Psalm-Book, or metrical version of the whole 
Psalter, in a form suited for public worship, that was used 
in the English Church, was that known as Sternhold and 
Hopkins. It was so called from the two men chiefly en- 
gaged in its production. It was completed in 1562. 

Thomas Sternhold, 1549, was groom of the robes to Henry 

VIII., and afterwards to Edward VI. He was a man of serious tem- 
perament, and being grieved at the lascivious ballads which prevailed 
among the courtiers, undertook his version of the Psalms with the 
laudable design of inducing these gay people of fashion to do as they 
had done in France, — sing Psalms instead of love-ditties. 

Sternhold's Psalms, though they did not take with the people of fashion, for whom 
they were primarily intended, were yet exactly in time for the new religious move- 
ment, and were put in England to the same use as were those of Clement Marot in 
Geneva. 

Fellow -Iiahorers. — Sternhold translated only the first fifty-one Psalms. The plan 
projected by him was carried on by a contemporary and coadjutor, John Hopkins, a 
Calvinistic clergyman, who graduated at Oxford about 1544. Hopkins translated fifty- 
eight of the Psalms, distinguished in the earlier editions by his initials. The others 
were by William Whittingham, a Calvinistic clergyman (who also versified the Deca- 
logue, Creed, Lord's Prayer, and who was the chief author of the Geneva Version of the 
Bible, etc.), Thomas Norton, the translator of Calvin's Institutes, William Kethe, who 
was an exile with Knox at Geneva, and Wisdome, Archdeacon of Ely. 

Publication of the Book. — The book thus formed was first published 
entire in 1562, with this title : " The Whole Book of Psalms collected 
into English Metre by T. Sternhold, J. Hopkins, and others, con- 
ferred with the Ebrue, with apt Notes to sing them withal." These 
" apt notes " were about forty tunes, of one part only, and one uni- 
sonous key, remarkable for a certain uniform sombre gravity, and 
nearly all being in the same metre. 

Its Character. — Not one of the parties concerned in this version seems to have 
had the slightest particle of taste, or feeling of genuine poetry. The language is 
occasionally elevated and pure, because the stanza is nothing more than the common 
prose version, with the words so arranged as to make lines and to rhyme. In the 
main the authors fully justify the language of Campbell, who says, that "with the 
best intentions and the worst taste, they degraded the spirit of Hebrew Psalmody 
by flat and homely phraseology ; and mistaking vulgarity for simplicity, turned into 
bathos what they found sublime." 



ENGLISH HYMNODY. 133 

Not Obligatory. — This metrical Psalter, sometimes called " The Old Version," 
was not obligatory upon tlie English Church, and found its way into the Prayer-Book 
by connivauce rather than by formal permission. But once there, it held undisputed 
sway for nearly two hundred years, and even yet has not entirely disappeared. 

Tate and Brady. 

A New Version of the Psalter appeared in 1696, one 
hundred and thirty-four years after the first appearance of 
Sternhold and Hopkins. 

The authca-s of the " New Version" were Nahum Tate (1652-1715), 
poet laureate, and Nicholas Brady, D. D. (1659-1726), chaplain to 
William III., both Irishmen by birth. This was " allowed and per- 
mitted to be used" by the King in 1696, and recommended by the 
Bishop of London in 1698 : neither it nor the " Old Version" was ever 
imposed upon the English Church ; their allowance, says Dr. Heylin, 
" seems rather to have been a connivance than an approbation." Tate 
and Brady gained but slowly upon its ancient rival, — not many years 
ago either was bound up with the various editions of the English 
Prayer-Book, according to the taste or the interest of the publishers. 

Rouse's Psalms. 

The Scotch Version of the Psalms was made in 1645, by 
Francis Pouse, an Engdish statesman. Pouse was a member 
of Parliament, and also of the Westminster Assembly, and 
was Provost of Eton under the Commonwealth. 

The Kirk " appointed John Adamson to revise the first forty psalms, 
Thomas Crawford the second forty, John Row the third, and John 
Nevey the last thirty." Eouse's Version, thus revised, was '' allowed 
and appointed to be sung" in 1649, and is still exclusively used by the 
stricter offshoots of the Scotch Kirk. 

Watts's Psalms and Hymns. 

The first English Hymn-Book used in public worship 
was that of Dr. Isaac Watts. There were other hymn 
writers before his time, but his collection, which came into 
use about 1715, was the first regular Hymn-Book. 

Note. — Until the time of Dr. Watts no such thing as a " Hymn- 
Book " was generally known, if we except the Hymns and Songs of 
12 



134 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

the Church, 1623, of George Wither (1588-1667), which received an 
exclusive patent from James I. 

A few good hymns come down to us from the sacred poets of this 
age, Herbert and his school, who are noticed elsewhere in this volume. 
Bishop Jeremy Taylor (1655) may here be mentioned, and Eichard 
Baxter (1681). John Austin, a Catholic writer, in his "Devotions," 
1668, published forty hymns, some of them very good and still in use. 
The ''Songs of Praise" (1683) of John Mason, Rector of Water- 
Stratford, Bucks, have very great merit. They went through several 
editions, and were then forgotten until recent years. W^illiam Barton's 
"Six Centuries of Hymns" (i. e. 600) had reached a fourth edition 
in 1688 ; as poetry they are very poor. Equally worthless is a volume 
of hymns by R. Davis, of which the third edition appeared in 1700. 
Joseph Stennett, D.D. (1663-1713), a Baptist, published, in 1697, thirty- 
seven hymns for the Lord's Supper, which have some merit ; and Mrs. 
Rowe in 1704 put forth five of a somewhat pretentious character. Nor 
must we omit to mention the few masterpieces of Bishop Ken (1700), 
and of Addison (1712). 

English Hymnody as such began with Dr. Isaac Watts 
(1674-1748)."^ 

Watts was an Independent minister, but ill-health confined him 
chiefly to a life of literary retirement. His last thirty-six years were 
spent at Sir Thomas Abney's, in Hertfordshire. In addition to his 
sacred verse, Dr. Watts wrote a work on Logic, and another on the 
Improvement of the Mind, both of which have been extensively used 
as school-books. His Catechisms for Children and Youth have also 
been much used, and have been the forerunners of innumerable other 
works of the same kind. Llis complete Works have been published 
in 7 vols., 8vo. 

Watts's Horfe Lyricse appeared in 1705-9, his Hymns in 1707-9, his 
Divine Songs in 1715, and his Psalms in 1719. Altogether, he is the 
author of over eight hundred hymns, counting the " Psalms," which 
are free paraphrases. 

No such body of sacred verse as Watts's had been seen 
or imagined before by Englishmen, and its effect was im- 
mense. For a long time his Psalms and Hymns entire were 
used, exclusively, or nearly so, by the great bulk of Dis- 
senters in Britain and of Calvinists in America, 



ENGLISH HYMNODY. 135 

Wesleyan Hymns. 

Within the same generation with Dr. Watts another 
school of hymnody was founded by a yet more fertile 
writer, Charles Wesley (1708-1788). 

Charles Wesley's works, beginning in 1739, number some fifty, large 
and small, and in a reprint now nearly completed fill twelve volumes. 
Of his separate hymns there must be fully six thousand. His life was 
one of great activity, but his thoughts naturally ran into rhyme and 
metre. He composed on horseback, and under all conceivable cir- 
cumstances. 

John Wesley possessed a poetic talent hardly inferior to that of his 
brother Charles, but it was less exercised. He often revised the other's 
writings, and some of their books appeared under their joint names. 

The Wesleyan Collection. — The choicest of the Wesleyan hymns 
appeared in John Wesley's great Collection, 1779, for which its editor 
claimed, with entire truth, that "no such hymn-book as this had yet 
been published in the English language." See also " Charles Wesley 
seen in his finer and less familiar Poems," IST. Y., 1867, for further 
information in regard to this most voluminous and brilliant of English 
sacred lyric poets. 

Successors to Watts and ^A/esley. 

Dr. Watts had many imitators or followers, of whom the most con- 
spicuous and useful were Philip Doddridge, D. D. (1702-1751), Inde- 
pendent pastor and teacher at Northampton, whose three hundred 
and seventy-four hymns appeared after his death, in 1755, and have 
passed through several editions; and Anne Steele (1716-1778), daugh- 
ter of a Baptist minister at Broughton in Hampshire, whose hymns, 
amounting to some two hundred (including versions of Psalms), with 
other poems, appeared under the name of " Theodosia " in 1760 and 
1780, and have been twice reprinted since. Other respectable writers 
of the same school, Baptist and Independent ministers, were Simon 
Browne (1680-1732), two hundred and seventy-three hymns, 1720 ; 
Thomas Gibbons, D. D. (1720-1785), over four hundred hymns, 1762- 
69-84; Benjamin Beddome, D. D. (1717-1795), eight hundred and thirty 
h^-mns, 1818 ; John Fawcett, D. D. (1739-1817), one hundred and sixty- 
seven hymns, 1782; Thomas Haweis (1732-1820), two hundred and 
fifty-six hymns, 1792-1808 ; Samuel Stennett, D. D. (1727-1795), thirty- 
eight hymns, 1787 ; Thomas Scott, 1773, one hundred and four hymns ; 
John Needham, 1768, two hundred and sixty-three hymns. 

Some hymnists wrote under the influence both of Watts and of Wcslev. 



136 ENGLISH LITERATUEE. 

The most eminent of these are the Ohiey hymnists, Cowper and Xew- 
ton, mentioned elsewhere; Toplady (1740-1778), among whose one 
hundred and twenty-four lyrics is what is generally allowed to be the 
finest English hymn, "Kock of Ages;" and Joseph Hart (1712-1768), 
whose two hundred and twenty-three hymns appeared in 1759-65, 

Noticeable thougti minor members of the same school, are Samuel Medley (1738- 
1799), two hundred and thirty-two hymns; Wm. Williams (1717-1791), one hundred 
and twenty-three hymns; John Ryland (1753-1825), ninety-nine hymns: Joseph Grigg 
(d. 1768) ; Edward Perronet (d. 1792) ; Robert Seagrave ; Robert Robinson ; and ^Valter 
Shirley. 

John Cennick (1717-1755), over six hundred hymns, 1741-44, William Hammond, 
(d. 1783), one hundred and sixty-five hymns, 1745, and Thomas Olivers (1725-1799), 
■were closer followers of Charles Wesley. 

The authors of the " Scotch Paraphrases," 1751 and 1775, Mrs. Barbauld (1743-1825), 
James Merrick (1720-1769), whose Version of the Psalms appeared in 1765, and John 
Byrom (1(191-1763), must be mentioned separately. The latter was a man of singular 
ability and character, a Christian philosopher of no common type, who wrote good 
epigrams as well as hymns and meditations, and might — had he cared for it — have 
W'on enduring fame. 

Some of these old authors, otherwise nearly or quite inaccessible, have been re- 
printed by Mr. Daniel Sedgwick, the London hymnologist, to whom much of the exist- 
ing knowledge of this whole subject is due. 

Hymnists of the Present Century.. 

During the first half of the present centur}^, the leading hymnist was 
the poet James Montgomery. One hundred of his hymns appeared in 
his Christian Psalmist, 1825. In 1853 he published three hundred 
and fifty-five. The most voluminous was Thomas Kelly of Dublin 
(1769-1855), whose eighth edition, 1853, contained seven hundred and 
sixty-five hymns. The work which exerted the deepest influence and 
gained the widest and most permanent popularity was Keble's Chris- 
tian Year, 1827; not, however, a book of hymns, though there are 
hymns in it. The few hymns of Bishop Heber (1783-1826) are of 
high character and repute. Sir John Bowring (born 1792) is still 
living, but his lyrics appeared in 1823-25. Other hymnists of notice- 
able ability and usefulness were Sir Robert Grant (1785-1838) ; Josiah 
Conder (1789-1855); Andrew Reed (1787-1862); James Edmeston 
(1791-1867) ; Henry Francis Lyte (1793-1847), author of "Abide with 
Me," one of the most exquisite hymns in our language ; Harriet Auber 
(1773-1832), the title of whose very valuable Spirit of the Psalms, 
1829, was borrowed, in 1834, by Lyte; and Sarah Flower Adams, 
(1805-49), who wrote "Nearer, my God, to Thee." 

Of names that come to our own time are Charlotte Elliott, author of 
"Just as I am;" Dr. Horatius Bonar (1808-69), many of whose hymns 



ENGLISH HYMNODY. 137 

are largely used ; and not to enumerate too many, George Kawson, 
Thomas Toke Lynch, and Thomas H. Gill, whose names will be better 
known hereafter than they are now. 

Present Aspect of English Hymnody. 

The aspect of English Hymnody has greatly changed within the 
last decade or two : witness the most popular Church-of-England 
hymnals of the day. 

In 1836, Dr. Newman, then beginning to be famous, translated a few of the old Bre- 
viary hymns, long forgotten or overlooked. This was the commencement of a revival 
of the generous stores of Latin hymnody, ancient and mediaeval. Newman was fol- 
lowed, on a much larger scale, in 1837, by John Chandler, whose work is very valuable 
and important, and by Bishop Mant, who has given us some excellent originals; in 
1839, by Isaac Williams; and in still later days by E. Caswall, R. Campbell, J. D. 
Chambers, W. J. Blew, Dr. Neale, and others, who have immensely enlarged, in value 
as in extent, our hymnic stock. The treasures of German hymnody were also opened 
by Miss F. E. Cox, A. T. Russell, R. Massie, Miss Bothwick, and Miss Catherine Wiuk- 
worth. The last named lady's Lyra Germanica and Choral Book are priceless acquisi- 
tions, and she is entitled to rank with our greatest hymnic benefactors. Dr. Watts, 
Charles Wesley, James Montgomery, and Dr. Neale. 

The field thus widened, and new models furnis'ied from abroad, native hymns began 
to be written in the style and spirit of these foreign ones, ancient or modern, so that 
now translations and originals, harmonizing well together, increase in number every 
year. In no age have more or better hymns been produced. One great name may be 
especially mentioned, that of .Tohn Mason Neale, D.D. (1818-1866), Warden of Sack- 
ville College, Avhose exquisite versions from the Greek and Latin are beyond pi-aise. 
As a translator of lyric poetry Dr. Neale has probably no superior. Of lesser names 
we may mention, beyond those already cited, F. W. Faber, Bishop Wordsworth, Mrs. 
C. F. Alexander. Dean Alford, Dr. Monsell, Sir H. W. Baker, M. Bridges, F. T. Pal- 
grave, and W. C. Dix. 

It is, however, more difficult to specify here than among the earlier 
hymnists ; and the historian of ten or twenty years hence will, by all 
appearances, have a more extensive and complicated task than we have 
to-day. 

EXTRACTS 
From the Versions of the Bible described in this Chapter. 

1. THE WYCKLIFFITE VERSION. 

A. — The Original, bt Wyckliffe, 1382. 

Thanne Jerusalem wcnte out to hym, and al Jude, and al the cuntre aboute Jordan ; 

and thei weren cristenyd of hym in Jordan, knowlecliynge there syiines. Sothely he 

seeynge many of Pharisees and of Saducese comniynge to his bapteme, saide to hem, 

Generaciouns of cddris, who showide to you for to Ilea fro wrath to cumme ? Therefore 

do yee worthi fruytis of penaunce, and nyl ye say with ynne you. We ban the fadir 

Abraham ; sothely Y saye to you, for whi God is miyti to reyse vp of these stonys the 

12* 



138 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

sonys of Abraham. For now the axe is putt to the rote of the tree ; sothely euery tree 
that makith nat good frnyt, shal be kitt douii, and shal be sent in to fijr. Fursotlie Y 
cristene you in water, in to penauuce ; forsothe he that is to cumme after me is strenger 
than Y, whos shou Y am not worthi to here ; he shal baptise, or crisUn, yow in the Holy 
Goost and fijr (Math, iii, 5-11). . . Fro thennus Jhesus bygau for to preche, and 

say, Do peuaunce, forsothe the kyngdom of heuens shal cume niye (Math, iv, 17). 

B. — The Revision, by Purvey, 1-388. 
Thaune Jerusalem wente out to hym, and al Judee. and al the cnntre aboute Jordan ; 
and thei weren waischun of hym in Jordan, and knowlechiden her synnes. Eut he 
siy manye of the Farysees and of Saduceis comynge to his baptym, and seide to hem, 
tSeneracionns of eddris, who shewide to you to fle fro the wraththe that" is to come? 
Therfor do ye worthi fruyte of penaunce, and nyle ye seie with ynne you, We han 
Abraham to fadir ; for Y seie to you, that God is myyti to reise vp of these stooues the 
sones of Abraham. And now the ax is put to the roote of the tree ; therfore euery 
tree that makith not good fruyt, shal be kit doun, and shal be cast iu to the fier. Y 
waische you in water, in to penaunce; but he that shal cume after me is strongere 
than Y, whos schoon Y am not worthi to here ; he shal baptise you iu the Ilooli Goost 
and fier. . . . For that ty me Jhesus bigan to preche, and seie, Do ye penaunce, for 
the kyngdom of heuenes schal come uij'. 

2. TYNDALES VERSION, 1534. 

Then went oute to hym lerusalem, and all Jury, and all the region rounde aboute 
Jordan, and were baptised of him in Jordan, confcssynge their synnes. "When he saw 
many of the Pharises and of the Saduces come to hys baptim, he sayde vnto them : 
generacion of vipers, who hath taught you to fle from the vengeaunce to come ? Brynge 
forth therefore the frutes belongynge to repentauuce. And se that ye ons thynke 
not to saye in your selues, we haue Abraham to oure father. Fur I saye vnto you, that 
God is able of these stones to rayse up chyldern vnto Abraham. Euen nowe is the 
axe put vnto the rote of the trees : soo that every tree which bringeth not forthe 
goode frute, is hewen douue and cast into the fyre. I baptise you in water in token 
of repentauuce : but he that cometh after me, is myghtier then I, whose shues I am 
not worthy to beare. He shall baptise you with the holy gost and with fyre. . . . 
From that tyme Jesus beganne to preache, and to saye : repent, for the kingdome 
of heven is at houde. 

3. COYERDALE'S YEUSION, 1.5.35. 

Then went out to hym lerusalem, and all Jury, and all the region rounde aboute 
Jordan, and were baptised of him in Jordan, confessynge their synnes. Now when 
he sawe manj' of the Pharises and of the Saduces come to hys bajitim, he sayde vuto 
them; ye generacion of viper.-?, who hath certified you, that ye shal escape the ven- 
geaunce to come ? Bewarre, brynge forth due frutes of pennaunce. Thinke not now, to 
saye in your seines, we haue Abraham to oure father. For I saye vnto you, that God is 
able of these stones to rayse vp chyldren vnto Abraham. Euen now is the axe put 
vuto the rote of the trees : therfore euery tre which bringeth not forth good frute, 
shalbe hewen downe, and cast into the fyre. I baptise you with water to repentaunce : 
but he that cometh after me, is myghtier then I, whose shues I am not worthy to beare. 
He shall baptise you with the holy goost and with fyre. . . . From that tyme forth 
beganne Jesus to preach, and to saye : Amende youre selues, the kingdome of heauen is 
at honde. 

4. MATTHEW'S VERSION, 1537. 

Then went oute to hym Jerusalem and all Jewry, and al the region rounde aboute 
Jordan, and were baptysed of hym in Jordan, confessinge theyr synnes. When he 
saw many of the Pharises and of the Saduces come to his bap tyme he said unto them: 
generation of vypers, who hath taught you to tie from the vengeaunce to come. Bring 



THE ENGLISH BIBLE. 139 

forth therfore the fruytes belonging to repentaunce. And se that ye ones think not to 
saye in your selues, wo Lave Abraham to oure father, for I saye unto you that God is 
able of these stones to rayse up chyldren unto Abi-aUum. Euen now is the axe putt 
unto the rote of the trees : so that euery tree which briugeth not forthe good fruyte, 
is heweu downe and cast into the fyre. I baptyse you in water in token of repentaunce : 
but he that commeth after me, is mightier then I, whose shoes I am not worthy to 
beare. He shal baptyse you with the holy goost and with fyre. . . . From that 
tyme Jesus began to preach, and to saye : repent, for the kingdom of heauen is at haude. 

5. THE GREAT BIBLE, 1539. 
Then went out to hym lerusalem and a".l Jewry, and all the regyon rounde aboute 
Jordan, and were baptysed of hym in Jordan, confessyng theyr synnes. But when 
he saw many of the Pharises and Saduces come to his baptyme, he sayd vnto them: 
generacyon of vypers : who hath taught you to fle from the vengeaunce to come ? 
Brynge forth therfore the frutes that belong to repentaunce. And be not of soch mynde 
that ye wolde saye with in youre selues : we haue Abraham to oure father. Tor I saye 
vnto you, that God is able to bring to passe, that of these stones ther shall ryse vp 
chyldren vnto Abraham. Euen now is the axe also put vnto the rote of the trees: so 
that euery tree which bryngeth not forth good frute, is hewen downe, and cast into 
the fyre. I baptise j'ou in \vater vnto repeutaimce, but he that shall come after me is 
mightier then I, whose shoes I am not worthy to beare. He shall baptyse you with 
the holy goost and with fyre . . . From that tyme, Jesus beganne to preache, 
and to saye: repent, for the kyngdome of heauen his at hande. 

6. THE GENEVA VERSION, 1560. 

5. Then went out to him lerusalem aud all ludea, and all the region rounde about 
Jordan. 

6. And they were baptised of him in lordan, confessing their sinnes. 

7. Now when he sawe many of the Pharises and of the Sadduces come to his baptisme, 
he said vnto them, generacions of vipers, who hathe forewarned you to flee from the 
angre to come ? 

8. Bring forthe therefore frutes worthie amendement of life, 

9. And thinke not to say with your selues, We haue Abraham to our father: for I 
say vnto you, that God is able of these stones to raise vp children vnto Abraham. 

10. And now also is the axe put to the roote of trees : therefore euerie tre, which 
bringeth not forthe good frute, is hewen downe, and cast into the fjTe. 

11. In dede, I baptise you with water to amendement of life, but he that cometh after 
me, is mightier then I, whose shoes I am not worthie to beare : he wil baptise you 
with the holie Gost, and with fyre 

17. From that time lesus began to preache, and to say. Amend your Hues : for the 
kingdome of heauen is at hand. 

7. THE BISHOPS' BIBLE, 1568. 

5. Then went out to him Ilierusalem, and all Jurie, and all the region round about 
Jordane, 

6. Aud were baptized of him in Jordane, confessing their sinnes. 

7. But when hee saw-e many of the Pharisees aud Sadducees come to his baptisme, 
he sayd vnto them, generation of vipers who hath warned you to flee from the anger 
to come ? 

8. Bring foorth therefore fruits meete for repentance, 

9. And be not of such minde, that ye would «ay within your selues, We haue Abra- 
ham to [oui-] father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise vp 
children vnto Abraham. 

10. Euen now is the axe also put vnto the roote of the trees : Therefore euery tree 
which bringeth not foorth good fruit, is hewen downe, and cast into the fire. 



140 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

11. I baptize you in water vnto repentance : but hoe that commeth after mee, is 
miglitier then I, whose shoes I am not worthy to beare, he shall baptize you with the 

holy ghost and with fire 

17. From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent ; for the kiugdome 
of heauen is at hand. 

8. THE RHEIMS-DOUAY VERSION. 
A. — The Okiginal, 1582. 

5. Then went forth to him Hierusalem and al Jevvrie, and al the countrey about 
lordan : 

6. And were baptized of him in lordan, confessing their sinnes. 

7. And seeing many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptisme, he sayde 
to them, Ye vipers brood, who hath shewed you to flee from the wrath to come? 

8. Yeld therfore fruite worthie of penance. 

9. And delite not to say within your seines, we haue Abraham to our father, for I 
tel you that God is able of these stones to raise vp children to Abraham. 

10. For now the axe is put to the roote of the trees Euery tree therefore that doth 
not yeld good fruite, shal be cut downe, and cast into the fyre. 

11. I in deede baptize you in water vnto penance, but he that shal come after me, 
is stronger then I, whoso shoes I am not vvoi-thie to beare, he shal baptise you in the 
Holy Ghost and fire 

17. From that tyme lesus began to preache, and to saye : Doe penance, for the King- 
dome of heven is at houde. 

B. — Challoner's Revision, 1750. 

5. Then went out to him Jerusalem and all Judea, and all the country about Jordan : 

6. And they were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins. 

7. And seeing many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said 
to them : Ye brood of vipers, who hath shewed yon to flee from the wrath to come ? 

8. Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance. 

9. And think not to say within yourselves : We have Abraham for our father : for I 
tell you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham. 

10. For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that 
yieldeth not good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire. 

11. I indeed baptize you with water unto penance : but he who is to come after me, 
is stronger than I, whose shoes I am not woi'thy to carry : he shall baptize you with 
the Holy Ghost and witli fire 

17. From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say : Do penance, for the kingdom 
of heaven is at hand. 

9.— KING JAMES'S VERSION, 1611. 

5. Then went out to him Hierusalem, and all Indea, and all the region round about 
lordane, 

6. And were baptized of him in lordane, confessing their sinnes. 

7. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his Baptisme, he 
said vnto them, generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to 
come? 

S. Bring forth therefore fruits meete for repentance. 

9. And thinke not to say within your selues. Wee haue Abraham to our father: for I 
say vnto you, that God is able of these stones to raise vp children vnto Abraham. 

10. And now also the axe is layd vnto the roote of the trees : Therefore euery tree 
which bringeth not foorth good fruite, is hewen downe, and cast into the fire. 

n. I indeed baptize you with water vnto repentance : bnt he that commeth after 
mee, is mightier then I, Whose shooes I am not worthy to beare, hee shall baptize you 
with the holy Ghost, and with fire 

17. From that time lesus began to preach, and to say. Repent, for the kingdoms of 
heauen is at hand. 




CHAPTER IX. 

•Milton and His Contemporaries. 

The next great name in English literature, in chrono- 
logical order, after Chaucer, Spenser, and Shakespeare, is 
that of Milton. 

The period to v/hich Milton more especially belongs is 
that of the Commonwealth and the Protectorate, 1649- 
1660. He is connected, however, in many ways, with the 
preceding reign, that of Charles I., 1625-1649, and to some 
extent with the succeeding reign, that of Charles II., 
1660-1685. 

The great historical events of this period are the rise of 
the House of Commons to power, ending in a rupture be- 
tween the Parliament and the King and the execution of 
the latter; the brief rule of the Commonwealth and of 
Cromwell ; and the Restoration of the Stuarts. 

Note. — The writers of this period, being very numerous, are di- 
vided into four Sections : 1. The Poets, beginning with Milton ; 2. Po- 
htical and Miscellaneous writers, beginning with Clarendon ; 3. Writers 
belonging to the Established Church, beginning with Bishop Hall ; 4. 
Non-Conformist writers, beginning with Baxter. 

I. THE POETS. 

Milton. 

John Milton, 1608-1674, if not the greatest of English 
poets, is second to Shakespeare only. Milton's chief poem, 

141 



142 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Paradise Lost, is unique in literary history, and is admitted 
by all to be one of the noblest achievements of human 
genius. 

Milton's personal character also has a certain stateliness 
and grandeur, hardly inferior to that of his chief poem, and 
is of itself enough to mark him as one of the great men of 
all time. There is no grander figure in English history 
than that of John Milton. 

Birth and Education. — Milton Avas a native of London, the son of a 
scrivener. His early education was begun by a private tutor, and was 
marked from the first by a zealous devotion to classical studies. The 
same trait followed him at Cambridge, where he acquired distinction 
as a Latin poet. He entered the University at the age of fifteen, and 
remained there seven years, taking his degree of Bachelor in 1628, 
and that of Master of Arts in 1632. 

Subsequent Studies. — After leaving the University, Milton retired 
to the house of his father, then living in the country, at Horton, in 
Buckinghamshire, and remained there five years, during which time 
he continued with unabated zeal to read the Greek and Latin writers. 
During this period of studious retirement, also, he wrote the poems 
Arcades, Comus, Lycidas, L' Allegro, and II Penseroso. 

European Travel. — In 1638, being then at the age of thirty, attended 
by a servant, Milton spent fifteen months in travel on the continent, 
visiting Paris, Genoa, Leghorn, Pisa, Florence, Eome, Naples, and 
other cities of Italy, "the most accomplished Englishman that ever 
visited her classic shores." 

Impression that he Made — The elegance of Milton's manner and 
of his person (he was remarkable for his beauty), and his extraordi- 
nary accomplishments and learning, made him everywhere the object 
of attention among men of letters. " I contracted," says he, " an inti- 
macy with many persons of rank and learning, and was a constant at- 
tendant at their literary parties, — a practice which prevails there and 
tends so much to the diffiision of knowledge and the preservation of 
friendship." Among the men of note whose acquaintance he made 
were Grotius, Galileo, Carlo Dati, Francini, and Manso. Being thor- 
oughly at home in the Italian language, he composed while in Italy 
several poems and complimentary Sonnets in Italian, which gained him 
great applause. 



THE POETS. 143 

Cause of his Return. — The news which Milton received from home 
of the unsettled state of aflairs led him to return to England sooner 
than he had intended. " When I was preparing to pass over into Sicily 
and Greece, the melancholy intelligence which I received of the civil 
commotions in England made me alter my purpose ; for I thought it 
base to be travelling for amusement abroad while my fellow-citizens 
were fighting for liberty at home." 

Occupation in London. — On Milton's return, he settled in London: 
" I looked about to see if I could get any place that could hold myself 
and my books, and so 1 took a house of sufficient size in the city ; and 
there, with no small delight, I resumed my intermitted studies, — chiefly 
leavmg the event of public affiiirs, first to God, and then to those to 
whom the people had committed that task." While thus living, he 
undertook the instruction of his two nephews, John and Edward Phil- 
lips, and of a few other lads, sons of his intimate friends. 

First Works as a Political Writer. — The afiairs of the nation ap- 
pear to have been uppermost in Milton's thoughts, and he began soon 
after that a series of remarkable treatises on matters of church and 
state, by which he became known throughout Europe as the foremost 
champion of the Commonwealth. He wrote, in 1641, Of Reformation 
touching Church Discipline in England, The Reason of Church Gov- 
ernment against Prelaty, and some other works of a like character, 
and in 1642, An Apology for Smectymnuus. 

Marriage and Divorce. — In 1643, Milton was married to INIary 
Powell, the daughter of a loyalist Justice of the Peace, in Oxfordshire. 
Something of romance seems to have entered into this affair ; and the 
lady, after living with him for a month, and not finding the Puritan 
atmosphere congenial, went on a visit to her father's house, and refused 
to return. Milton, thereupon, believing that the Scriptures gave to the 
husband, under such circumstances, the right of divorce, proceeded 
formally to repudiate his wife. 

Treatises on Divorce. — After thus repudiating his wife, Milton pub- 
lished in rapid succession his famous treatises on this subject: The 
Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce ; Tetrachordon, or Exposition of 
the Four Chief Places in Scripture which treat of the Nullities of 
Marriage ; The Judgment of the Famous Martin Bucer touching Di- 
vorce ; Colasterion. 

End of the Matter. — The matter ended in the wife's becoming re- 
pentant, and in Milton's taking her back ; they seem to have lived 
happily together afterwards. 



144 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Two Admired Treatises. — About the same time, 1644, Milton pub- 
lished his two prose works which have been most admired, A Tractate 
on Education, and Areopagitica, or A Plea for the Liberty of Unlicensed 
Printing. 

Appointment as Latin Secretary. —In 1648, Milton was appointed 
Latin Secretary to the Council of State, and he afterwards held the 
same office under Cromwell. This office was equivalent to that of 
Secretary for Foreign Afikirs, matters of diplomacy being then con- 
ducted chiefly in Latin. 

Work as Secretary. — The business of the Secretary, however, at 
least as conceived by Milton himself, was not only to write the dis- 
patches to foreign governments, but to compose from time to time such 
treatises on afiairs of state as might be needed to vindicate the pro- 
ceedings of his Government before the public tribunal of the world. 
An abler, more conscientious, or more independent advocate, probably, 
was never raised up for any great political party. His various " Trac- 
tates" are as celebrated in their way as was the military or the politi- 
cal career of Cromwell, and are almost as much a part of the history 
of the times. 

The titles of some of these essays are the following : The Tenure of 
Kings and Magistrates, Proving that it is Lawful to Call to Account a 
Tyrant or Wicked King ; Eikonoklastes, literally " The Image Breaker," 
written to weaken the force of the book put forth by the royalist party, 
called Eikon Basilike, " The Royal Image ; " and A Defence of the 
People of England against Salmasius. 

Controversy with Salmasius. — This work was written in Latin, and 
was the crowning effi3rt of Milton's genius in political writing. Sal- 
masius was the picked champion of the royalist party on the continent. 
He was a man of great learning and eloquence, and had written, also 
in Latin, A Defense of Charles I. It was the appeal of the royalists 
against the republicans, and was trumpeted throughout Europe as un- 
answerable. Milton's reply was so crushing in its force that Salmasius 
is said to have died of chagrin at the mortifying defeat. 

After the Restoration. — On the downfall of the Commonwealth and 
the Restoration of the Stuarts, Milton found it necessary to keep him- 
self out of the public view until the passage of the Act of Oblivion, in 
1660. 

His Blindness. — In 1653, while in the midst of his political labors, 
and partly in consequence of them, Milton became totally blind. He 
had from youth suffered from weakness of the eyes, and the excessive 



THE POETS. 145 

use of them in this season of intense excitement hastened the final dis- 
aster. Several of his political Tractates, and all his longer Poems, 
were composed while he was thus shut out from all sight of the exter- 
nal world. 

Milton was three times married, but had surviving children only by 
his first wife, — three daughters. 

During the latter years of his life, in consequence of the celebrity of 
his writings, he was an object of great interest and reverence to for- 
eigners visiting England, and his house was often thronged with distin- 
guished visitors. 

The Paradise Lost, commenced many years before, was published in 
1667; Paradise Kegained and Samson Agonistes were published in 1671. 

Slow Recognition of the Poem. — Milton's great poem, after its com- 
pletion, had to wait two years before it could fimd a publisher, and even 
then its way to fame was very slow. The whole amount received by 
him and his family from the copyright of it was only £28. 

The odium attached to him for his championship of a defeated po- 
litical party was doubtless one cause of so tardy a recognition. " Wal- 
ler, not Milton, was long considered the A'irgil of the nation." — Lon- 
don Quarterly. Waller himself, in the heyday of his pride, wrote these 
words : " The old blind schoolmaster, John Milton, hath published a 
tedious poem on the Fall of Man : if its length be not considered a 
merit, it hath no other." 

Macaulay on Milton. — The noblest piece of criticism in the language 
is Macaulay' s celebrated essay on Milton, first published in the Edin- 
burgh Eeview. Milton has found at length a worthy biographer, also, 
in Prof. Masson, of Edinburgh. The following extracts are from Ma- 
caulay's celebrated essay. 

His 3InJestic Patience. — "If ever despondency and aspei-ity could be excused 
in any man, they might have been excused in Milton. But the strength of his mind 
overcame every calamity. Neither blindness, nor gout, nor age, nor penury, nor do- 
mestic afflictions, nor political disappointments, nor abuse, nor proscription, nor neg- 
lect, had power to disturb his sedate and majestic patience. Ilis spirits do not seem 
to have been high, but they were singularly equable. His temper was serious, per- 
haps stern ; but it was a temper which no sufferings could render sullen or fretful. 
Such as it was when, on the eve of great events, he returned from his travels, in the 
prime of health and manly beauty, loaded with literary distinction, and glowing with 
patriotic hopes, such it continued to be when, after having experienced every calamity 
which is incident to our nature, old, poor, sightless, and disgraced, he retired to his 
hovel to die." 

Cliief Charactefdstic of his Toetry. — "The most striking characteristic of 
the poetry of Milton is the extreme remoteness of the associations by means of which 
it acts on the reader. Its effect is produced, not so much by what it expresses, as by 
18 K 



14G MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

■what it suggests : not so much by the ideas which it directly conveys, as by other 
ideas which are connected with them. He electrifies the mind through couductois. 
The most unimaginative man must understand the Iliad. Homer gives him ho choice, 
and requires from him no exertion, but takes the whole upon himself, and sets the 
images in so clear a light, that it is impossible to be blind to them. The works of 
Milton cannot be comprehended or enjoyed, unless the mind of the reader co-operate 
with that of the writer. He does not paint a finished picture, or play fur a mere pas- 
sive listener. He sketches, and leaves others to fill up the outline. He strikes the 
key-note, and expects his hearers to make out the melody." 

Tlie Enchantment of his Verse. — "We often hear of the magical influence 
of poetry. The expression in general means nothing: but applied to the writings of 
Milton, it is most appropriate. His poetry acts like an incantation. Its merit lies 
less in its obvious meaning than in its occult power. There would seem, at first sight, 
to be no more in his words than in other words. But thej' are words of enchantment. 
No sooner are they pronounced, than the past is present and the distant near. New 
forms of beauty start at once into existence, and all the burial-places of the memory 
give up their dead." 

U Allegro and U Penseroso. — " In none of the works of Milton is his pecu- 
liar manner more happily displayed than in the Allegro and the Penseroso. It is im- 
possible to conceive that the mechanism of language can be brought to a more exqui- 
site degree of perfection. These poems differ from others, as attar of roses differs 
from ordinary rose water, the close-packed essence from the thin diliited mixture. 
They are indeed not so much poems, as collections of hints, from each of which the 
reader is to make out a poem for himself. Every epithet is a text for a stanza." 

His Prose Writings. — " It is to be regretted that the prose writings of Milton 
should, in our time, be so little read. As compositions, they deserve the attention of 
every man who wishes to become acquainted with the full power of the English lan- 
guage. They abound with passages compared with which the finest declamations of 
Burke sink into insignificance. They are a perfect field of cloth of gold. The style 
is stiff with gorgeous embroidery. >'ot even in the earlier books of the Paradise Lost 
has the great poet ever risen higher than in those parts of his controversial works in 
which his feelings, excited by conflict, find a vent in bursts of devotional and IjtIc 
rapture. It is, to borrow his own majestic language, 'a sevenfold chorus of halle- 
lujahs and harping symphonies.' " 

Waller. 

Edmund Waller, 1605-1687, was in his day regarded as 
one of the great lights of English literature. It is now only 
by sufferance that he holds in literature any place at all. 

His Career. — "Waller studied at Eton and Cambridge, and was mem- 
ber of Parliament almost continuously from his eighteenth year to his 
death. BQs political career Avas not glorious, to say the least. In the 
Long Parliament he was at first an adherent of Hampden. He then 
went over to the royahsts, and being detected in a plot to re-establish 
the authority of Charles I., he was obliged to make full confession in 
abject terms and was banished the kingdom. He was allowed to re- 



THE POETS. 147 

turn in 1653, and soon succeeded in ingratiating himself into favor 
with Cromwell, whose praises he sang in his well-known Panegyric to 
my Lord Protector. This is one of his happiest efforts. When Charles 
II. was restored, Waller composed a similar poem on the King's happy 
return, which was not so successful. Thenceforth his life was mi- 
eventful. 

His Poems. — Waller's poems are nearly all short occasional pieces, 
chiefly of an amatory nature. The Sacharissa of his verse was Lady 
Dorothy Sidney, whom he wooed in vain. In connection with Godol- 
phin, Waller also translated the fourth book of the .^Eneid. 

His Popularity. — Waller was one of the popular poets of the age 
of the Restoration, and regarded as the most elegant and refined 
master of style. But the following generation, and also our own, are 
more discriminating and more exacting. 

" There are not, perhaps, two hundred really good lines in "Waller's poetry. Ex- 
travagant conceits, feeble verses, and defective rhymes, are constantly recurring, 
although the poems, being mostly short, are not tedious. Of elevated imagination, 
profound thought or passion, he was utterly destitute ; and it is only in detached pas- 
sages, single stanzas, or small pieces, finished with great care and excellence, as the 
lines on a lady's girdle, those on the dwarfs, and a few of the lyrics, that we can dis- 
cern that play of fancy, verbal sweetness, and harmony which gave so great a name 
to Edmund "Waller for more than a hundred j'ears." — Carruthers. 

Cowley. 

Abraham Cowley, 1618-1667, was accounted in his day 
the greatest of English poets. This verdict also has long 
since been reversed. 

Cowley was, undoubtedly, a man of abilities, and an accomplished 
scholar ; but his poems lack truth and naturalness. He tried to make 
poetry out of what he had read in books, instead of making it out of 
his own experience of life. 

Career. — Being a royalist, Cowley followed the Stuarts into exile 
during the time of the Commonwealth, and came in with them at the 
Kestoration. He did not, however, obtain from the restored family 
such reward as his fidelity and services seemed to warrant, and his last 
days were not happy. 

Poems. — Cowley's poetical works are divided into four parts: Mis- 
cellanies ; Mistress, or Love Verses ; Pindaric Odes ; and The Davideis, 
a heroic poem, celebrating the troubles of David. 



148 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOR AKIES. 

" Who now reads Cowley ? If he pleases yet, 
His moral pleases, not his pointed wit : 
Forgot his epic, nay, Pindaric art, 
But still I love the language of his heart." — Pope. 

Prose Writings. — Cowley wrote several essays in prose, which are 
now more admired than his poems. In his prose pieces, he forgets the 
conceits and appellations which mar his poetry, and gives a natural and 
pleasing expression to his thoughts. " No author ever kept his ver^e 
and his prose at a greater distance from each other." — I)r, Johnson. 

"The manners of the Court and of the age inspired Cowley with a portion of gal- 
lantry, but he seems to have had no deep or permanent passion. He expresses his 
love in a style almost as fantastic as the euphuism of old Lyly or Sir Fiercie Shafton. 
' Poets,' he says, ' are scarce thought free men of their company, without paying some 
duties and obliging themselves to be true to love;' and it is evident that he himself 
composed his ' Mistress ' as a sort of task-work. There is so much of this wit-writing 
in Cowley's poetry, that the reader is generally glad to escape from it into his prose, 
where he has good sense and right feeling, instead of cold, though glittering conceits, 
forced analogies, and counterfeited passion. His anacreontic pieces are the happiest of 
his poems ; in them he is easy, lively, and full of spirit. They are redolent of joy and 
youth, and of images of natural and poetic beaiity, that touch the feelings as well as 
the fancy. His ' Pindaric Odes,' though deformed by metaphysical conceits, though 
they do not roll the full flood of Pindar's unnavigable song, yet contain some noble 
lines and illustrations.'" — Chambers. 

Wither. 

George Wither, 1588-1667, was a poet of some note in his 
own day, who, after having passed almost into oblivion, has 
in recent times risen again into favor. 

His Career. — Wither was educated at Oxford, and subsequently 
studied law, but seems to have neglected the profession for literature 
and politics. He was imprisoned for a satire entitled Abuses Stript 
and Whipt, in 1614. While in prison, he composed a counter-satire 
dedicated to the King, which gained his release. In 1639, he took 
part in the King's expedition against the Scotch, but soon after turned 
to the other side and joined the Parliament forces. Under Cromwell, 
he was made Major-General of the County of Surrey. After the Kesto- 
ration, however, he was imprisoned for his Vox Vulgi. 

Wither was, until recently, neglected by critics and the public ; and 
his restoration to notice is due chiefly to the praises of Southey, Lamb, 
and others in the present century. 

"Works. — Wither was an exceedingly voluminous writer. The list 
of his separate publications numbers nearly one hundred. Among the 



THE POETS* 149 

best are Ms Shepherd's Hunting, Wither's Motto (Nee habeo, nee careo, 
nee euro), Faire- Virtue, the Mistress of Philarete, The Hymns and 
Songs of the Church, Collection of Emblems, Hallelujah, or Britain's 
Second Eemembrancer, etc. 

" Dismissing with contempt the puerilities and conceits which deformed the pages 
of so many of his contemporaries, he cultivated, with almost uniform assiduity, a sim- 
plicity of style and an expression of natural sentiment and feeling which have occa- 
sioned the revival of his choicest compositions in the nineteenth century, and will 
forever stamp them with a permanent value." — Brake. 

Herriek. 

Robert Herriek, 1591-1662, was a lyric poet of consider- 
able note, in the times of the Commonwealth and the Res- 
toration. 

His Career. — Herriek was born in London and educated at Cam- 
bridge. He took holy orders and was presented by Charles I. with a 
vicarage, but was ejected during the civil war. At the Eestoration, he 
was reinstated in his living. He was equally unclerical in his man- 
ner of life and in his writings. He was a frequenter of taverns, where 
he " quaffed his mighty bowl " with Ben Jonson and other boon com- 
panions. His verse is mostly of the light, anacreontic kind, and some 
of it is loose and licentious. 

Works. — Herriek published Noble Numbers, or Pious Pieces, con- 
taining only hynms and other religious lyrics ; also, Hesperides, con- 
taining both devotional pieces and anacreontics, or "works human and 
divine," as he himself styled them, and the two kinds are sadly mixed 
up. With all his irregularities, however, he was a genuine poet, and 
often wrote with singular sweetness and beauty. Some of his short 
lyrics, Cherry Kipe, Gather the Kose Buds while ye may, To Blossoms, 
To Daffodils, To Primroses, &c., are often quoted. The following lines 
seem to show that towards the close of his life he repented of his errors : 
"For these my unbaptized rhymes, 

Writ in my wild unhallowed times. 

For every sentence, clause, and word. 

That 's not inlaid with thee, O Lord ! 

Forgive me, God, and blot each line 

Out of my book that is not thine ; 

But if, 'mongst all, thou findest one 

Worthy thy benediction. 

That one of all the rest shall be 

The glory of my work and me." 
13 * 



150 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

"The poet might better have evinced the sincerity and depth of his contrition hy 
blotting out the unbaptized rhymes himself, or nut reprinting them ; but the vanity 
of the author probably triumphed over the penitence of the Christian. Gayety was 
the natural element of Ilerrick. His muse was a goddess fair and free, that did not 
move happily in serious numbers. There is, in his songs and anacreontics, an unforced 
gayety and natural tenderness, that show he wrote chiefly from the impulses of his 
own cheerful and happy nature. The select beauty and picturesqueness of Herrick's 
language, when he is in his happiest vein, is worthy of his fine conceptions ; and his 
versification is harmony itself. His verses bound and flow like some exqiiisite lively 
melody, that echoes nature, by wood and dell, and presents new beauties at every turn 
and winding. The strain is short, and sometimes fantastic ; but the notes long linger 
in the mind, and take their place forever in the memory. One or two words, such as 
'gather the rose-buds,' call up a summer landscape, with youth, beauty, flowers, and 
music. This is, and ever must be, true poetry." — Chambers. 

Suckling. 

Sir John Suckling, 1608-1642, was pre-eminently the 
cavalier-poet of the times of Charles I. 

Career. — Suckling studied at Cambridge. On the death of his 
father, in 1627, he came into the possession of large estates, went 
abroad, and in 1631 enlisted in the army of Gustavus Adolphus. In 
1632 he returned to England, and made himself conspicuous as a gay 
cavalier. When the King undertook his expedition against the Scotch, 
Suckling raised a troop of one hundred horsemen, brilliantly capari- 
soned, at his own expense. At the sight of the enemy, however, they 
broke and fled without striking a blow. This furnished the occasion 
for innumerable satires and lampoons. Suckling's next exploit was an 
unsuccessful attempt to rescue Strafford from the Tower, which obliged 
him to flee to the continent. He died soon afterwards at Paris, in want 
and obscurity. 

His Works. — Suckling's poetical works are of three kinds, — his 
dramas, which are of little value, his longer pieces, which are not much 
read, and his ballads and songs. These last have placed Suckling at 
the very head of English writers of song. They are not characterized 
by any very profound emotion, but are unsurpassed for sprightliness 
and ease. His Ballad on a Wedding, Tell me ye Juster Deities, When, 
Dearest, I but think of Thee, and others, are among the gems of song. 
In the Ballad on the Wedding occur the oft-quoted lines — 
" Her feet beneath her petticoat, 
Like little mice, stole in and out, 
As if they feared the light." 

A Selection from his Works, with a Sketch of his Life and Remarks on his Writings 
and Genius, was published in 1836 by the Rev. Alfred Suckling. 



THE POETS. 151 

Samuel Butler, 1612-1680, was a humorous writer of 
great celebrity. 

Butler's chief work, Hudibras, is a sort of English Don Quixote. 
Hudibras is universally received as one of the best works of wit and 
humor to be found in the language. The wit indeed often depends 
upon circumstances and allusions with which the public are no longer 
familiar, and therefore the work is not so generally read as it once was. 
Still it is, and it will ever be, a great favorite. The object of the poem 
was to ridicule the Puritans. 

" It is not only the best burlesque poem written against the Puritans of that age, so 
fertile in satire, but it is the best burlesque in the English language. The same amount 
of learning, wit, shrewdness, ingenious and deep thought, felicitous illustration, and 
irresistible drollery, has never been comprised in the same limits." — Chambers. 

Another poem of Butler's, The Elephant in the Moon, designed as a satire upon the 
Royal Society, was also an admirable production. 

Thomas Carew, 1589-1639, was a poet and a gay courtier 
of the time of Charles I. 

Carew's poetry, chiefly short amatory pieces and songs, was of the 
conventional kind then in fashion. It aimed at graceful compliment 
and gallantry rather than at truth. All his pieces are short and occa- 
sional, except one, a Masque, Coelum Britannicum, written by command 
of the King. His songs were exceedingly popular at the time. 

"Among the poets who have walked in the same limited path, he is pre-eminently 
beautiful, and deservedly ranks among the earliest of those who gave a cultivated 
grace to our lyrical strains." — Campbell. 

Sir William Davenant, 1605-1668, had a high reputation in his 
day as a dramatist. He succeeded Ben Jonson as Poet Laureate, and 
at his death was buried in Westminster Abbey, witli the inscription, 
" O Rare Sir William Davenant ! " 

Anthony Wood's Accotmt. — A part of Anthony Wood's account of him is 
worthy of note for the reference which it contains to another and much greater poet : 
" His mother was a very beautiful woman, of a good wit and conversation, in which 
she was imitated by none of her children but by this William. The father * * was 
a very good and discreet citizen, yet an admirer and lover of plays and play-makprs. 
especially Shakespeare, who frequented his house in his journeys between Warwick- 
shire and London." 

Political Troubles, — In the political commotions resulting in the expulsion of 
the Stuarts, Sir William became involved, being a royalist. PI(- was imprisoned at 
different times, lived abroad a while, was released from the Tower by the interposition 
of Milton, a brother poet, and on the Restoration, himself interposed for the protec- 
tion of Milton from the fury of the monarchists. 



152 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Worhs. — His works are: Al bovine, King of the Lombards, a Tragedy; Cruel 
Brother, a Tragedy ; The Unfortunate Lover, a Tragedy ; Love and Honor, a Play ; 
The Man's the Master, a Comedy; Madagascar and Other Poems; Gondibert, an 
Heroic Poem, &c. 

Gondibert. — Gondiihevt is the work most frequently quoted, because of the con- 
troversy to which it led. By Waller, Cowley, and others, it was applauded in the 
highest terms. By other critics, it was so violently assailed that the author felt 
obliged to reply to their censures. The work was left unfinished. The part written 
contains more than 6,000 lines. 

John Taylor, 1580-1654, seK-styled " The Water-Poet," was col- 
lector of the wine fees for the Lieutenant of the Tower, and keeper of 
a public house at Oxford and of another at Westminster. 

Wor'Jcs. — Taylor is the author of over one hundred and thirty poems and pieces, 
descriptive, satirical, and humorous. They have little merit in themselves, but are 
valuable as illustrative of the manners of the age. His chief occupation seems to have 
been the composition of satires against the Roundheads. 

Francis Kouse, 1579-1658, is celebrated for his metrical version 
of the Psalms. 

Career. — Rouse was educated at Oxford. He was a member of successive Parlia- 
ments in the time of Charles I. ; was a member of Cromwell's Privy Council, and one 
of the few laymen appointed by the House of Commons to sit in the Assembly of Di- 
vines at Westminster. He published a number of works, but is now known only by 
one. The Psalms Translated into English Metre, 1646. 

Rouse's version was recommended to the attention of the Westminster Assembly by 
the House of Commons, and was intended to supersede the version by Sternhold and 
Hopkins. Rouse's version is still used with loving reverence by a large and respecta- 
ble body of Presbyterians, both in Great Britain and America. 

Alexander Eoss, 1590-1654, was a poet of some note in his day, 
and was chaplain to Charles I. 

Ross was a native of Aberdeen, Scotland. He was a man of learning and piety, but 
infected with the quaint conceits of the age. One of his works was entitled Mel Heli- 
conium, or Poetical Honey gathered out of the Woods of Parnassus. He wrote A View 
of All the Religions of the World. It is to this learned work that reference is made 
in Hudibras : 

"There was an ancient sage philosopher. 
Who had read Alexander Ross over." 
One of his most noted works was a Latin poem on the life of Christ, called Virgilius 
Evangelizans, and giving the history of our Lord in almost the identical words of 
Virgil. The fii'st five lines will show the character of this strange conceit: 
"Acta Deunique cano, coeli qui primus ab oris 

Virginis in laetfe gremium descendit, et orbem 
■' Terrarum invisit profugns, Chanangea que venit 
Littora: multum.Ille et terra jactatus et alto 
Vi superum, saevi memorem Plutonis ob iram." 

He won great applause by this ingenious absurdity. 



THE POETS. 153 

Francis Quarles, 1592-1644, was a quaint writer of some note in 
the times of Charles I. 

Quarles was a graduate of Cambridge, and a man of learning and ability, but of such 
wretched taste that his works, though admirable for their moral and religious char- 
acter, have fallen into general neglect. He was a partisan of the Royalists, and as 
such fell under the displeasure of the Parliamentary party, who sequestered his estates, 
and plundered him of his books and even of his manuscripts. 

Quarles's works, mostly poetical, are numerous. The following are the titles of a 
few : A Feast for Worms, in a Poem on the History of Jonah ; Hadassah, or his His- 
tory of Queen Esther ; The History of Sampson ; Job Militant, with Meditations Divine 
and Moral ; Sion's Sonnets Sung by Solomon the King ; Sion's Elegies Sung by Jeremy 
the Prophet ; Pantaeologia, or the Quintessence of Meditation ; Divine Fancies, digested 
into Epigrams, Meditations, and Observations ; Midnight Meditations of Death ; Manual 
of Devotion ; Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man ; The Virgin Widow, a Comedy ; Argalus 
and Parthenia, a Poem ; The Enchiridion, containing Institutions Divine and Moral ; 
Emblems, in five Books, etc. 

Quarles's Emblems, somewhat modernized, is still occasionally read. 

John Quaeles, 1624-1665, son of the preceding, and a chaplain in the royal army, 
shared in the fortunes of his party. After the downfall of the Royalists, he lived in 
London and devoted himself to literature. He died of the Plague. The following are 
some of his works : Poems ; A Kingly Bed of Misery ; God's Love and Man's Unworthi- 
ness ; The Banishment of Tarquin ; Triumphant Chastity, or Joseph's Self-Conflict ; 
Divine Meditations; The Tyranny of the Dutch against the English, a prose narra- 
tion, etc. 

Thomas May, 1594-1650, was a poet of note in the time of the civil 
wars in England between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians. 

May had been a favorite with Charles I., but, on the breaking out of the war, he 
sided with the Parliament, and was appointed its Historiographer or Secretary. He 
wrote a History of the Long Parliament, which was published "by authority." It 
baa been highly lauded or severely criticized, according to the political bias of his 
judges, but, on the whole, is not so thoroughly partisan as might be expected under 
the circumstances. It is, in fact, a temperate history of the civil war as seen through 
the eyes of the Parliamentarians. 

May was a very accomplished scholar. Among other literary achievements, he 
wrote a translation of Lucan's Pharsalia into English verse, and a continuation of it 
in Latin verse. He also translated the Georgics of Virgil into English verse, with an- 
notations. He wrote also four Tragedies, Antigone, Cleopatra, Agrippina, and Julius 
Caesar; two Comedies, The Heir, and The Old Couple ; two historiLal Poems, The Reign 
of Henry II., and The Victorious Reign of Edward III. 

"The latter [Parliament] had, however; a writer who did them honor: May's His- 
tory of the Parliament is a good model of genuine English; he is plain, terse and vig- 
orous, never slovenly, though with few remarkable passages, and is, in style as well 
as substance, a kind of contrast to Clarendon." — Hallam. 

William Habington, 1605-1645, was educated at the College of 
St. Omer, and was intended originally for the Catholic priesthood, but 



154 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOH A RIES. 

changed his purpose. He published a volume of Poems, under the 
title of Castava ; The Queen of Arragon, a Tragi-Comedy ; and A His- 
tory of Edward IV. 

"The poetry of Habington is that of a pure and amiable mind, turned to versifica- 
tion by the customs of the day, having a real passion for a lady of birth and virtue, 
the Castava, whom he afterwards married : but it displays no gTeat original power, nor 
is it by any means exempt from the ordinary blemishes of hyperbolical compliment 
and far-fetched imagery." — Hallam. 

Sir Eichard Fanshawe, 1608-1666, was a famous scholar and 
negotiator in his day. 

Fanshawe was educated at Cambridge, travelled a good deal on the continent, and 
was employed in the foreign diplomatic service of the government. He died at Mad- 
rid, wliile ambassador to the Court of Spain. Hi3 works are chiefly Translations: The 
Lusiad of Camoens ; The Faithful Shepherd of Guarino, etc. ; also, Original Letters and 
Negotiations of Sir Richard Fanshawe, 4to. 

Ann Harrison, Lady Fanshawe, 1625-1680, Avife of Sir Richard, wrote a volume of 
Memoirs, which throw some light upon the times. 

Sir John Denham, 1615-1668, was born of distinguished parentage, 
and enjoyed the advantages of a University education ; but he was con- 
sidered slow and dull, and he was addicted to the vice of gambling. 
At the age of twenty-six, however, he published The Sophy, a Tragedy, 
which at once made him famous. 

" He broke out like the Irish reljellion, threescore thousand strong, when nobody 
was aware, or in the least suspected it." — Waller. 

This was followed two years after by Cooper's Hill, a Poem, which still furtter 
established his reputation. " Cooper's Hill is, and ever will be, the standard of good 
writing." — Dryden. 

He wrote also The Destruction of Troy, Cato Major, etc. "Denham is deservedly 
considered one of the fathers of English poetry. Denham and Waller, according to 
Prior, improved our versification, and Dryden perfected it." — Dr. Johnson. 

KiCHARD Crashaw, 1650, one of the minor poets of this period, 

was a clergyman and an eloquent preacher of the English Church, 
who went over to the Catholics. 

Crashaw afterwards settled in Paris, where Cowley found him in great pecuniary dis ■ 
tress. lie died abroad. He published a volume of Latin poems which are well spoken 
of In one of them occurs the original of the beautiful metaphor sometimes ascribed 
to Dryden, about the miracle of the water changed to wine : " The modest Avater saw 
its God and blushed," — Nympha pudlca Deum vidit, et erulmit. Crashaw published also 
a volume of English poems : Steps to the Temple ; The Delights of the Muses ; Music's 
Duel, etc. He made, also, translations from the Latin and the Italian, which have 
been admired for their elegance. He was a great favorite with Cowley. 



THE POETS. 155 

"Poet and saint! to thee alone are given 
The two most sacred names of earth and heaven." — Cowley. 

William Cartwright, 1611-1643, a graduate of Oxford, was cele- 
brated in his day almost equally for his eloquence as a preacher and 
for his poetry. 

Cartwright was Lecturer on Metaphysics in the University, and Junior Proctor, and 
died at the age of thirty-two. He published The Royal Slave, a Tragi - Comedy ; 
Tragi-Comedies and Other Poems, etc. •' He became the most florid and seraphical 
preacher in the University." — Wood's Athen. Oxon. 

" Cartwright, rare Cartwright, to whom all must bow. 
That was the best preacher, and best poet too." — John Leigh. 

" It is difficult to conceive, from the perusal of Cartwright's poems, why he should 
have obtained such extraordinary applause and reputation. His pieces are mostly 
short, occasional productions, addresses to ladies and noblfemen, or to his brotlier 
poets, Fletcher and Jouson, or slight amatory effusions not distinguished for elegance 
or fancy. Ilis youthful virtues, his learning, loyalty^ and admiration of genius seem 
to have mainly contributed to his popularity, and his premature death would renew 
;n the impression of his worth and talents." — Chambers. 



EiCHARD Lovelace, 1618-1658, was the author of a collection of 
poems entitled Lucasta, Lux Casta, signifying Miss Lucy Sacheverel. 

Lovelace was son of Sir William Lovelace. He was a loyalist, served under Charles 
L, and was imprisoned until the King's death. 

" Richard Lovelace, as a man and as a writer, may be taken as an impersonation 
of the cavalier of the civil wars, with much to charm the reader and still more to 
captivate the fair." — Miss Mitford. 

Charles Cotton, 1630-1687, a Cambridge scholar, gained some 
celebrity as a translator and a humorous poet. 

Among his works are some of Lucian's Dialogues into English Fustian; Yirgil 
Travestie ["Nothing can be more vulgar, disgusting, or licentious than his parodies 
on Virgil and Lucian."] ; and Voyage to Ireland, a humorous poem. 

Cotton was a cheerful, witty, and accomplished man, but utterly devoid of prudence 
in his aflFairs, and always in debt. Even his marriage to a Countess Dowager, with a 
jointure of £1500 a year, did not snfflce to keej) his head above water. He was espe- 
cially devoted to angling; and one of his best claims to continued memory is his dis- 
cipleship to good old Tzaak Walton, to whose Complete Angler Cotton wrote an 
appendix or continuation, How to Angle for a Trout or Grayling in a Clear Stream. 

William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, 1592-1676, a zealous 
partisan of Charles I., wrote several works : Five Comedies ; Tlie Tri- 
umphant Widow ; System of Horsemanship, etc. 

Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, 1673, was the 

author of many works. 



j56 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

The following are her chief works : Philosophical Fancies ; Poems and Fancies ; The 
World's Olio : Nature's Picture drawn by Fancy's Pencil ; Letters and Poems ; Grounds 
of Natural Philosophy; Observation upon Experimental Philosophy; Philosophical 
and Physical Opinions ; Sociable Letters ; Orations ; Twenty-Six Plays ; Life of William 
Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle [her husband], etc. 

" I imagine all those who haTe read my former books Avill say I have writ enough, 
unless they were better ; but say what 3'ou will, it pleaseth me, and since my delights 
are harmless, I will satisfy my humor: 

" For had my brain as many fancies in 't 
To fill the world, I'd put them all in print; 
No matter whether they be well or ill exprest, 
My will is done, and that pleases woman best." 

" She was the most voluminous writer of all the female poets, and had a great 
deal of wit." — Jacobs. 

" Her person was very graceful. She was most indefatigable in her studies, con- 
templations, and writings; w'as truly pious, charitable, and generous, and a perfect 
pattern of conjugal love and duty." — Ballard. 

" A fertile pedant, with an abounding passion for scribbling ! " — Horace Walpole. 

Richard Brome, -^ lCo2, was a dramatist of good repute. He was originally a 

servant of Ben Jonson. He wrote fifteen plays. Those best known are The Jovial 
Crew; The Northern Lass; The Court Beggar; and The City Wit. 

Alexander Brome, 1620-1666, was a satirical poet, who exercised his gifts at the 
expense of the Roundheads. The Cunning Lovers, a Comedy; Fancy's Festivals, etc. 

Sidney Godolphin, 1610-1643, was a poet of some celebrity in his time. He was 
slain in battle, fighting on the King's side. He wrote several original poems, and 
translated the Loves of Dido and ^neas, from Yirgil. 

Richard Braithwait, 1588-1673, was a poet of some celebrity in the first half of the 
seventeenth century. Works : The Prodigal's Tears ; The Golden Fleece ; The Poet's 
Willow; Survey of History; Solemn Jovial Disputation; English Gentleman; English 
Gentlewoman, &c., &c. 



II. POLITICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 

Clarendon. 

Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, 1608-1673, was an 
eminent writer and statesman of the times of Charles I. and 
Charles II. 

Career. — Clarendon favored the Stuart cause, but with moderation. 
After Charles I. was beheaded, Clarendon remained abroad with 
Charles II., and came in with the Kestoration. He was at the head 



POLITICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 157 

of the ministry under Charles II., and his daughter, Ann Hyde, was 
married to the King's brotlier, the Duke of York. Two of his descend- 
ants through her became Queens of England — Mary and Anne. *' For 
some time, no minister was ever possessed of more absolute authority." 
— Hume. There is a difierence of opinion as to the efiects of his coun- 
sels. The Tories, to whose party he belonged, regarded his adminis- 
tration as wise and beneficent : the Whigs, on the contrary, regarded 
it as disastrous. ** The circumstance that he had long been an exile 
completely disqualified him for the supreme direction of affairs." — Ma- 
cauLay. On the accession of the Whigs to power, he was deprived of 
his office and driven into exile, and he ended his days abroad, though 
after his death his remains were allowed to be deposited in Westmhi- 
ster Abbey. 

Works. — Clarendon's writings are numerous, and are of the highest 
value. They are important, not only as authentic records of grave 
historical transactions, by one who was a chief actor in them, but as 
noble specimens of English literature. His chief work is his History 
of the Rebellion, that is, of the civil war connected with the expulsion 
and restoration of the Stuarts. It is a large work, printed usually in 
6 or 7 vols. 8vo. Some of his other works are : Character of Robert, 
Earl of Essex, and of George, Duke of Buckingham ; Brief View of 
Hobbes's Leviathan ; History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in Ire- 
land ; An Account of his Life, &c., &c. Clarendon wrote also a large 
part of the State Papers during the reigns of Charles I. and Charles II. 

" His great work is not written ia the studied manner of modern historical compo- 
sitions, but in au easy flowing conversational style; and it is generally esteemed for 
the lively description which the author gives, from his own knowledge and observa- 
tion, of his most eminent contemporaries. The events are narrated with that fresh- 
ness and minuteness which only one concerned in tliem could have attained ; but some 
allowance must be made, in judging of the characters and the transactions described, 
for the political prejudices of the author, which, as already seen, were those of a 
moderate and virtuous royalist. The chief faults with which his style is chargeable, 
are prolixity and involution, which render some portions of the work unreadable, 
except with a great effort of attention." — Chambers. 

A Good Rule — One of Clarendon's rules, for the guidance of his own 
life, was to seek his companionship among those better than himself; 
and he declares that "■ he never was so proud, or thought himself so 
good a man, as when he was the worst man in the company." He 
adopted this rule, not for the purpose of fawning and courting favor, 
but because of the naturally stimulating and elevating effect of asso- 
ciating with one's betters. 
14 



158 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOR A EI ES. 

Selden. 

John Selden, 1584-1654, was celebrated in his day as a 
statesman and a jurist, and as a writer on legal and politi- 
cal subjects. 

Career. — Selden was educated at Oxford, and was renowned among 
his contemporaries for his learning and acumen. He was well versed 
in the classic and the oriental languages, and in ancient and interna- 
tional law. In 1629 he was imprisoned m the Tower, on a charge of 
sedition. He represented the city of Oxford in the notorious Long 
Parliament, and in the contest between the King and the Parliament 
he did not take any decided part. 

TTor/c*. — Strictly speaking, Selden's name does not belong to English literature, 
as his works were chiefly composed in Latin. Prominent among them are his treatise 
on the Syrian Divinities {De Diis Syris), his Mare Olausum or Closed Sea, written to 
maintain England's exclusive right to the sea against Grotius's Mare Librum, his Law 
of Nature and of Nations according to the Hebrews, and his Commentaries on Fleta, 
an English legal treatise written in the reign of Edward I. or of Edward II. 

Selden was hiiihly esteemed by his contemporaries for his personal character and 
his sincere love of freedom, and also for his brilliant conversational powers. 

Prynne. 

William Prynne, 1600-1669, an English Puritan, was 
first brought into notice by his book, Histrio-3Iastix, A 
Scourge for the Players, and by the barbarous punishment 
to which he was subjected on account of it. 

Character of the Book. — Prynne's book was a general tirade against 
stage-plays, as being "sinful, heathenish, lewd, ungodly spectacles," 
and against the ''profession of play-poets and stage-players" and the 
"frequenting of stage-plays," as being "unlawful, infamous, and mis- 
beseeming Christians," "besides sundry other particulars concerning 
dancing, diceing, health-drinking, &c." This furious blast was no off- 
hand performance, but a laborious work, in quarto, on which the author 
employed several years of toil. He cites, in favor of his positions, 
fifty Synods and Councils, seventy-five Fathers, one hundred and fifty 
Protestant and Catholic writers, and forty heathen philosophers. The 
references in his book are over one hundred thousand. He quotes at 
times from three to five hundred authors on a single point. 

Sis Tunishmenf. — To silence so audacious a scribbler, the Government expelled 
him from the University, degraded him from the bar, fined him £5,000, set him twice 



POLITICAL AXD M ISC E L L A X E OUS . 159 

on the pillory, burned his book before his eyes by the commou hangman, sentenced 
him to imprisonment for life, cut off both his ears, and burned upon both his cheeks 
the letters S. L., " Schismatic Libeller," but according to his own version, Sigrmafa 
Laudis, " The Marks of Praise." Such were some of the sweet persuasives of argument 
in the "good old times! " 

Subsequent Career. — When the government of Charles was overthrown, and 
the Roundheads came into power, Prynne was released from prison by order of the 
Commons, restored to office, and made a member of Parliament. Yet when the ques- 
tion came about the execution of the King, Prynne sturdily resisted the motion, and 
being again thrown into prison for contumacy- and " for denying the supremacy (jf 
Parliament," he wrote another treatise attacking Cromwell and the army as sturdily 
SIS he had attacked the Players and Playgoers. At the Restoration, when Charles II. 
and the Royalists came again into power, Prynne was once more at large, and the 
object of courtly favor. 

His Character. — Individuality bristled all over him, making him troublesome 
as an opponent, and not altogether comfortable as a friend ; and he continued to the 
end of his days fighting avaiy in the great war of opinions. The number of his 
works, many of them large and voluminous, is over fifty. A large part of them are 
directed against the Catholics. Nearly all of them are stoutly controversial. 

Bulstrode Whitelocke, 1605-1676, was a j^olitical writer 
of some note in this period. 

Career. — He was son of Sir James "WMtelocke, a well-known Eng- 
lish judge; was educated at Oxford, and admitted to the bar; and was 
made a member of the Long Parliament, ffis policy was vacillating, 
adverse to the arbitrary course of the King, and yet not wholly in 
favor of energetic measures of resistance. He was made Commissioner 
of the Admiralty, and occupied several prominent positions under 
Cromwell. In 1653 and 165-i he was ambassador to the Court of 
Sweden. 

JVorJcs. — Whitelocke's journal of his embassy, published in 1772, has been pro- 
nounced the best written of his works, and a valuable contribution to the history of 
Sweden. During his life he published a work in favor of Monarchy as the best form 
of government, and several Speeches. After his death appeared his Memorials of Eng- 
lish Affairs, an interesting record of the political events from the accession of Charles 
I. to the restoration of Charles II. The style is somewhat dull and at times trivial. 
But its value as a contemporary record is great and unquestionable. The latest edi- 
tion appeared at Oxford. 1852. He also left in manuscript a Memorial of English His- 
tory from the supposed expedition of Brute to the end of the reign of James I., which 
was published, 1709, by AVilliam Penn, the Governor of Pennsylvania. His Notes upon 
the King's Writ for choosing Members of Parliament is a learned treatise on a very 
abstruse point of English law. 

Sir Matthew Hale, 1609-1676, though celebrated mainly 
as a jurist, ha.s also an honorable record as a man of letters. 



160 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Career. — Sir Matthew studied at Oxford, and in Lincoln's Inn. He 
was made Sergeant-at-Law in 1652, C'liief Baron of the Exchequer in 
1660, and Lord Chief Justice of England in 1671 ; and was one of the 
most renowned and upright judges that ever graced the English 
bench ; equally honored for his general knowledge, legal attainments, 
and purity of character. 

WorTes. — A complete collection of his Moral and Religious Works was published 
in 2 vols., 8vo, 1805, London. The best known of his legal writings are The History 
of the Pleas of the Crown ; The History of the Common Law of England ; and the tract 
on The Trial of Witches. 

" His writings have raised him a character equal to his greatest predecessors, and 
will always be esteemed as containing the best rationale of the grounds of the law of 
England. Nor was he an inconsiderable master of polite, philosophical, and especially 
theological learning." — Dr. Birch. 

John Goodwin, 1593-1665, was a zealous republican and inde- 
pendent, and took an active part in procuring the condemnation of 
Charles I. 

Goodwin wrote a treatise in defence of his course, entitled The Obstructors of Jus- 
tice, which, with Milton's Iconoclastes, was burnt by the hangman on the Restora- 
tion. Some of his other works are The Divine Authority of Scripture Asserted ; Right 
and Might Well Met, or a brief and impartial inquiry into the proceedings of the army 
under Lord Halifax ; Redemption Redeemed ; Christian Theology, etc. 

James Harrington, 1611-1677, educated at Oxford, is principally 
known as a political writer by his Oceana, a kind of political romance, 
in imitation of Plato's Atlantis. 

Harrington published also several other political treatises, an essay on Tirgil, and 
a metrical translation of four books of the Mneid. Harrington, although prolix and 
visionary, will always be entitled to respect as an early supporter of political liberty. 

Owen Feltham, 1608-1678, was a royalist in the civil war, and is chiefly known as 
the author of a work on casuistry called The Resolves. 

John Godolphin, 1617-1678, was a civilian of eminence. Judge of the Admiralty, and 
King's Advocate. Besides several works on Admiralty law, he wrote works of a theo- 
logical and religious character, which give him rank among the Puritan writers; The 
Holy Limbec, foL; The Holy Harbor, a Body of Divinity, fol., etc. 

John Clieveland, 1613-1659, was a champion of the royal cause, who not only fought 
for it against the Commonwealth, but exercised for it his poetical talents, which were 
considerable. He published The King's Disguise; Petition to the Lord Protector for 
the Scots Rebel, a Satire; The Rustic Rampart ; Poems, Orations, etc. Clieveland was 
very popular in his own day, but has now pretty nearly passed into oblivion. 

Akthur Anne^ley, Earl of Anglesey, 1614-1686, Lord Privy Seal, was the author of 
several political and theological works : Truth Unveiled, with a Treatise on Transub- 



POLITICAL AND MISC E LL A XE OUS . 161 

stantiation; The King's Eight of Indulgence in Spiritual Matters; Happy Future 
State of Englaud. 

Sir AVilliam Petty, 1623-1687, was a physician by education, but 
more distinguished as an early and able writer upon politico-economical 
subjects. 

The bulk of Petty's writings still lie unpublished, in MS. Of his printed works 
the best perhaps arc : A Tract concerning Money (against laws limiting the rate of 
interest), A Discourse on the Extent and Value of Lands, The Political Anatomy of 
Ireland. Sir William was Secretary to Henry Cromwell in Ireland. He appears to 
have anticipated many of the deductions of a later age, and has been pronounced an 
extraordinary man. 

Hobbes. 
Thomas Hobbes, 1588-1679, achieved joermanent distinc- 
tiou as a writer by a philosophical work called The Levia- 
than, in which he treats of the fundamental principles of 
political science. 

Career. — Hobbes was educated at Oxford ; travelled on the continent 
several times, as tutor of the Prince of Wales (Charles II.), Lord 
Cavendish, and other young noblemen ; in 1654 returned permanently 
to England, and died at the country-seat of the Duke of Devonshire, 
in whose family he had served as tutor to three successive gener- 
ations. 

fVorJis. — Hobbes published a number of works, among them a translation of 
Thucydides, and an inferior translation of the Iliad and the Odyssey, pronounced by 
Pope "too mean for criticism;'' also, treatises on Political Elements, on Human 
Nature, and on The Elements of Philosophy. The vrork last named gave rise to a vio- 
lent miithnmatical discussion about the quadrature of the circle, in which Hobbes 
made himself ridiculous. 

The Leviathan. — Hobbes's fame rests almost exclusively on his Leviathan, or 
The Matter, Form, and Power of a Commonwealth. This treatise, which reduces all 
theory of government to blind submission to the ruling power, has been the subject 
of more attention and more denunciation than any other political work in the lan- 
guage. At the time of its appearance it was denounc'd l,y writers of all classes. His 
system of ethics was declared to be pure selfishness, reducing the conscience and emo- 
tions to a mere judgment of what succeeds or fails. Of late years, however, there is 
a tendency to reopen the judgment passed upon Hobbes and to consider his positions 
more carefully. Certain it is that Hobbes is one of the most vigorous, independent 
thinkers in the annals of England, anticipating more than one of the discoveries of 
recent political science, while in point of style he may serve as a model for any age. 

" A permanent foundation of his fame remains in his admirable style, which seems 
to be the very perfection of didactic language. Short, clear, precise, pithy, his lan- 
guage never has more than one meaning, which it never requires a second thought to 
take. By the help of his exact method, it takes so firm a hold on the mind that it 
will not allow attention to slacken." — Sir James Macldntosli. 

14* L 



162 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOE AEIES. 

Sir Thomas Browne. 

Sir Thomas Browne, M. D., 1605-1682, was a profound 
thinker and a writer of robust English, though he had a 
fancy for using words of Latin origin, and especially for 
giving Latin titles to his works. 

Chief Work — His most celebrated production is Beligio Medici, The 
Keligion of a Physician, which " was no sooner published than it ex- 
cited the attention of the public by the novelty of its paradoxes, the 
dignity of its sentiment, the quick succession of images, the multitude 
of abstruse allusions, the subtilty of disquisition, and the strength of 
language." — Dr. Sam. Johnson. It was translated into the Latin, 
ItaUan, German, Dutch, and French. As a sequel to this work, the 
author wrote Christian Morals, which is also in high repute. 

Other Works. — Another -n-ork is Pseudodoxia Epidcmica, an Inquiry into Tulgar 
Errors. Hydriotaphia, or Urn-Burial, was occasioned by the accidental discover}- of a 
few buried urns in Norfolk. "The extent of reading displayed in this single treatise 
is most astonishing, and the whole is irradiated with the flashes of a bright and liighly 
poetical genius, though we are not sure that any regular plan can be discovered in the 
work." — Cunningham's Biog. Hist. The Garden of Cyrus, or The Quincunxial 
Lozenge, is a work in which he displays his learning and bis ingenuity in finding 
everywhere traces of this form : " quincunxes in heaven above, quincunxes in earth 
below, quincunxes in the mind of man, quincunxes in tones, in optic nerves, in roots 
of trees, in leaves, in every thing." — Coleridge. " A reader, not watchful against the 
power of his infusions, Avould imagine that decussation was the great business of the" 
world, and that nature and art had no other purpose than to exemplify and imitate a 
quincunx." — Johnson. 

Ziatimsed Diction. — Sir Thomas Browne's fancy for a Latinized diction has 
already been mentioned. He carries this at times to such an excess as to become 
almost unintelligible to a reader not acquainted with Latin. "Ice is onlj' water con- 
gealed by the frigidity of the air, whereby it acquireth no new form, but rather a con- 
sistency or determination of its fluency, and emitteth not its essence, but condition 
of fluidity. Neither doth there anything properly conglaciate but water, or watery 
humidity ; for the determination of quicksilver is properly fixation, that of milk co- 
agulation, and that of oil and unctuous bodies only incrassation." He used currently 
such words as ampliate, diiucidate, manduction, indigitate, reminiscential, evocation, 
adveuient, ariolation. lapifidical, &c. 

Bishop Wilkins. 

John Wilkins, D. D., 1614-1672, Bishop of Chester, 
though eminent as a dignitary of the English Church, is 
chiefly and most favorably known as a philosophical writer. 

Career. — Bishop Wilkins was born at Fawsley, Northamptonshire, 
and educated at Oxford. He married a sister of Oliver Cromwell. He 



POLITICAL AND M ISCE LL A XEOUS . 163 

was very zealous in the work of founding the Eoyal Society, and pub- 
lished many works of a philosophical character. He was appointed 
by Kichard Cromwell Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, but was 
afterwards ejected. He was subsequently made Prebendary of London 
and of Exeter, and finally Bishop of Chester. 

Worlxs. — Bishop Wilkins"s publications show him to have been a man of a philo- 
sojihical mind, and to have been in manj' things in advance of his contemporaii 'S. 
Tlie following are his chief works: Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosoph- 
ical Language, in which he anticipates the modern phonograpliers ; Mercury, or The 
Swift and Secret Messenger, showing how a Man may with Privacy and Speed Com- 
municate his Thoughts to a Friend at any Distance, which looks almost as if he had 
been on the verge of stumbling upon the Telegraph; Discovery of a New World, a 
discourse tending to prove that it is probable there may be another habitable world 
iu the moon, with a discourse concerning the possibility of a passage thither ; Discourse 
concerning a New Planet, proving that it is probable that our Earth is one of the 
planets: Mathematical Magic, or the wonders that may be performed by mechanical 
Geometry. He published also a number of theological works : Ecclesiastes, or The 
Gift of Preaching; The Gift of Prayer; The Principles and Duties of Natural Re- 
ligion, &c. 

Sir Kenelm Digby, F. E. S., 1603-1648, was a courtier of the 
reign of Charles I. He was a man of science and letters, and during 
his residence in France, after the expulsion of the Stuarts, he associated 
with Descartes and other learned men on the continent. Digby returned 
to England after the Eestoration. He was reputed to be versed in the 
occult art. 

Besides several works in Latin, Digby wrote the following in English: A Conference 
with a Lady about the Cboice of Religion ; Observations on Sir Thomas Browne's Re- 
ligio Medici ; Observations on Stanza 22, Canto 9, Book II. of tbe Fairy Queen, " con- 
taining a verj' deep philosophical commentary upon these mysterious verses: "Dis- 
course concerning the Cure of Wounds by Sympathetic Powder; Cbymical Secrets; 
The Body and Soul of Man; Infallibility of Religion, etc. Sir Kenelm was quite as 
famous in his day for the beauty of his wife as for bis own talents and attainments. 
"A lady of an extraordinary beauty and of as extraordinary a fame." — Clarendon. 
Ben Jonson wrote many pieces in her praise. 

" 'T were true that I died too, now she is dead, 
"Who was my muse, and life of all I said ; 
The spirit that I wrote with, and conceived : 
All that was good or great with me, she weaved." — B. Jonson. 

Thomas White, 1582-1676, an eminent Catbolic divine and philosopher, v.-as born at 
Ilatton, in Essex. He was ordained priest at Douay in 1617, and taught philosophy 
and divinity there. He was also, for a time, President of the English College at Lis- 
bon. He served for several years on the mission in England; and resided at one time 
with Sir Kenelm Digby, whose philosophy he supported. His last years were spent 
in England. He died in London, at the age of ninety-four. The greater part of his 
works are in Latin. Among his English writings are the following: Dialogues Con- 



164 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

cerning the Judgment of Common Sense in the Choice of Religion ; Contemplation of 
Heaven; The Grounds of Obedience and Government; Religion and Reason Mutually 
Corresponding and Assisting Each Other; The Middle State of Souls, from the Hour 
of Death to the Day of Judgment, etc. 

Abraham Woodhead, 1608-1678, a Catholic writer of considerable note, was a native 
of Yorkshire. He was educated at Oxford, became distinguished for his learning, and 
was made Fellow. Becoming converted to the Catholics, he was deprived of his Fel- 
lowship. He spent the latter part of hia life in retirement, teaching a few pupils in 
Catholic families, and writing books in advocacy of his adopted faith. The following 
are some of his works: Concerning Images and Idolatry; Catholic Theses; Motives to 
Holy Living; Compendious Discourse on the Eucharist; Faith Necessary to Salvation; 
The Adoration of Our Blessed Saviour in the Eucharist; The Necessity of Church 
Guides ; Brief Account of Ancient Church Government, etc. 

Charles I., King of England, 1600-1649, appears in the roll of 
authors, although it is difficult to determine how far the papers attrib- 
uted to him were written by him. 

Soon after his death his Works appeared in several editions. He was a man of 
ability, and he may have written these papers which were thus issued in his name. 
One of these particularly, whether written by him, or by one of his partisans, for the 
purpose of awaking sympathy in his favor, is worthy of notice. It is called The Eikon 
Basilihe, or Portraiture of his Sacred Majesty in his Solitude and Sufferings. This 
book forms a part of the literary and political history of the times. No less than forty- 
seven editions of it were circulated, and the pictures it gives of the meekness and pa- 
tience of the saintly sufferer, so wrought upon the popular mind as to be one of the 
chief means of bringing about the restorfttion of the royal family. 

leman, a 
was 



"It would be absurd to deny that he [Charles I.] was a scholar and a gentlen 
lan of exquisite taste in the fine arts, a man of strict morals in private life. 11 
s good a writer and speaker as any modern sovereign has been." — Macaulay 



Vane. 

Sir Harry Vane, 1612-1662, was one of the most con- 
spicuous men of the troublous seventeenth century. 

Career. — Vane studied at Oxford, and travelled extensively on the 
continent, where he became confirmed in republican and anti-episco- 
pal views. In 1635, he emigrated to New England, and was there 
elected governor for one year. The next year, however, he returned to 
England. Through family influence he was made Treasurer of the Navy, 
but voluntarily resigned this lucrative and honorable position, and joined 
the Pym party. During the civil war Vane became a leader of the In- 
dependents, as they were called, and, after the defeat of Charles, was a 
bitter and persistent opponent of Cromwell's military dictatorship. He 
was even imprisoned for a few months in consequence of his work, A 
Healing Question Propounded and Kesolved. At the Eestoration 



POLITICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 165 

Vane was one of the twenty exempted from the general amnesty, and 
was tried and executed for liigh treason. 

CJiaracter. — Like so niauj' others among the Independents, Vane was ahead of 
his times. He was among the very first to assert direct liberty of conscience. He 
hated Presbytery and the Presbyterians of tliat time almost as much as he hated 
Bishops and Episcopacy. He was restive under every system of ecclesiastic or other 
domineering. Moreover he was a visionary and a fanatic, "a thorn in the flesh of 
Cromwell," a vigorous but eccentric intellect. His works, which are exclusively 
theological, contain much profound thought marred by extravagance and mysticism- 
Altogether he is one of the characteristic phenomena of the age. 

Andrew Marvell, 1620-1678, was a writer and a political 
leader of some celebrity ; but he is chiefly known by his con- 
nection with Milton and his early championship of the merits 
of Paradise Lost. 

Marvell was educated at Cambridge, took an active part in political 
affairs, and from 1660 to the time of his death, was a member of Par- 
liament. He was an intimate friend of Milton, and in 1657 was ap- 
pointed Milton's assistant in the Latin Secretaryship. His poems were 
chiefly satirical. The one best known is The Eehearsal Transposed, 
directed against Bishop Parker, and so effective in its wit that Parker 
was silenced by it. There is much discrepancy of opinion among 
the critics as to Marvell' s merits. 

" There are unquestionably many of his genuine poems which indicate a rich though 
ill-cultivated fancy, and in some few stanzas there is no little grace of expression. 
The little piece on the Pilgrim Fathers entitled the ' Emigrants,' the fanciful ' Dialogue 
between Body and Soul,' and the 'Conmet,' all contain lines of much elegance and 
SAveetness. It is in his satirical poems that, as might be expected from the character 
of his mind, his fancy appears most vigorous ; though these are largely disfigured by 
the characteristic defects of the age, and many, it must be confessed, are entirely with- 
out merit. His Latin poems are amongst his best. The composition often shows no 
contemptible skill in that language: and here and there the diction and versification 
are such as would not have absolutely disgraced his great coadjutor, Milton. In all 
the higher poetical qualities there can of course be no comparison between them." 
— Henry Rogers in the Edinburgh Review. 



Izaak ^A/alton. 

Tzaak Walton, 1593-1683, a quaint writer of this period, 
is held in great repute, especially for his Complete Angler. 

Career. — Walton appears to have been of humble birth. Of his 
early life nothing is known except that he had a linen-draper's sliop 



I 



166 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

in London. In 1643 he retired from business, and lived thenceforth 
in leisure, devoting himself to angling and reading. Congeniality of 
sports, aided by his sweetness of temper, brought him in contact with 
many of the famous men of his times. His second wife being a half- 
sister of Bishop Ken, he had an additional opportunity of enjoying the 
society of men of letters. 

JFotJcs. — Walton's earliest pnMication was an elegy on Donne, which was soon 
followed by an account of the Doctor's life. In 1653 appeared The Complete Angler, 
or The Contemplative Man's Recreation, an unpretending volume which at once took 
and has ever since held a place among English classics. The book lias so much of the 
author and his quaint, genial spirit, that it may almost be called an autobiography. 
Besides the Angler, and the Life of Donne, "Walton wrote Lives of Wotton, Hooker, 
Herbert and Sanderson. These biographies vie in excellence with the Angler. They 
have ever been regarded as models of pure, easy composition. "Walton's life must be 
regarded, in its tranquillity and simplicity, as a striking phenomenon, a perfect idyl, 
amidst the turmoil and passion of the Rebellion and the Restoration. 

" Walton's Complete Angler . . seems by the title a strange choice out of all the 
books of half a century; yet its simplicity, its sweetness, its natural grace, and happy 
intermixture of graver strains with the precepts of angling, have rendered this book 
deservedly popular, and a model Avliich one of the most famous among our late philoso- 
phers, and a successful disciple of Izaak Walton in his favorite art, (Sir Humphrey 
Davy,) has condescended (in his Salmonia) to imitate." — Hallam. 

James Howell, 1594-1606, a native of Wales, was educated at Oxford. He travelled 
extensively on the continent, and was imprisoned by Parliament. Howell was the 
author of over forty original treatises and some translations. The only one of hia 
works generally known and read is his Epistolse IIo Elianse, or Familiar Letters, Writ- 
ten in part during his imprisonment. It is the second published correspondence of 
the kind, and is rich in curious facts and incidents of English history. 

Thomas Stanley, 1625-1678, was the son of Sir Thomas Stanley, 
Knight, of Camberlowe Green, Hertfordshire. He was educated at 
Oxford, and spent part of his youth in travel. 

Stanley is noted in classical literature as the author of a learned edition of ^schylus. 
He wrote also The History of Philosophy, in 4 vols, fol., containing the lives, opinions, 
actions, and discourses of the philosophers of every sect. It is a bulky and erudite 
work, but so uncouth and obscure in style, that though valuable for its stores of infor- 
mation, it has been almost entirely superseded. The following sentence Avill serve as 
a specimen of its style : " Scepticism is a faculty opposing phenomena and intelligibles 
all manner of ways, whereby we proceed through the equivalence of contrary things 
and speeches, first to suspension, and then to indisturbance." Stanley published also 
a Volume of Poems, partly original, and partly translations from Anacreon, Bion, and 
Moschus. These differ vastly from the History in style, and are clear and direct in 
expression, though affected by the conceits of the age. 

Edward and John Phillips, nephews and pupils of Mil- 
ton, were both men of letters. 



POLITICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 167 

Edward Phillips, 1630-1680, is especially noted for his connec- 
tion with the English Dictionary, being one of the earliest authors 
who undertook the task of collecting English words in the form of a 
Dictionary. 

Phillips's work, A New World of Words, or A General English Dictionary, appeared 
in 1657. It contained many mistakes and omissions, and was severely criticized by 
Thomas Blount in his World of Errors Discovered in the New World of Words : yet 
after all, it was an important and valuable work. The English Dictionary, as we now 
have it, is not the creation of any one man, but is a growth, continued tlirough many 
generations. It is an accumiilation of national wealth from many successive sources, 
and Edward Phillips was one of the many contributors to the noble storehouse. 

Other JVorJcs. — Besides his New World of Words, Phillips published Theatrum 
Poetarum, or A Complete Collection of the Poets. This work includes a large number 
of names, and in its judgments upon different authors is supposed to give frequent 
evidences of Milton's helping hand. Phillips published also The Mysteries of Love 
and Eloquence ; an edition of the Poems of Drummond of Ilawthornden ; A Life of 
Milton ; and several other works. 

John Phillips, , wrote a defence of Milton, in Latin ; 

but subsequently changed his politics, and wrote A Satire against 
Hypocrites, being an attack on the character of Cromwell. 

Phillips wrote also An Introduction to Astrology, in ridicule of Lily's Christian 
Astrology; The Present State of Europe; Tlie I*i-escnt Court of Spain; The General 
History of Europe ; Tlie English Eortune-Tellei-s. He translated Don Quixote (" a 
very vulgar, unfaithful, and course translation." — TicJcnor); Tavernier's Voyage in 
Turkey, 2 vols., fol. ; Gulot's Voyage to Constantinople, etc., etc. 

Sir Henrt Blount, 1602-1682, was a gentleman of ancient family, one of whose an- 
cestors was the founder of Trinity College, Oxford. Sir Henry, who was an alumnus 
of that institution, distinguished himself by the publication of a volume of Travels to 
the Levant, which passed through many editions. He wrote also An Epistle in Praise 
of Tobacco. 

Thomas Blount, 1618-1679, a Catholic writer and jurist, sprang from a branch of the 
same family to which Charles, Sir Henry, and Sir Thomas Pope Blount belonged. The 
publications of Thomas Blount were numerous: Glossographia, a Dictionary of Ob- 
scure Legal Terms ; The Art of Making Devises ; The Lamps of the Law and the 
Lights of the Gospel; The Academy of Eloquence, or Complete English Rhetoric; A 
Criticism on Phillips's New World of Words; A Catholic Almanac, etc. 

Henry Carey, Earl of Monmouth, 1596-1661, a nobleman of leisure and of cultivated 
tastes, translated into English several historical works : History of the Late Wars of 
Christendom; Historical Relations of the United Provinces; Politic Discourses, from 
the Italian, etc. 

John Ogilby, 1600-1676, a native of Scotland, was celebrated as a publisher in Lon- 
don. The works of Virgil and Homer he himself translated — the former alone, the 
latter in company with Shirley. Among the many curious books which he printed v.-as 
one called America and the Remarkable Voyages thither, in a large folio with many 
maps and illustrations. 



168 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Lady Dorothy Pakington, 1679, daughter of Lord Coventry and wife of Sir 

John Pakington, was eminent for her piety and intelligence, and wrote several essays 
which were held in high estimation: The Gentleman's Calling, The Lady's Calling, 
The Government of the Tongue, The Christian's JJirthright, The Causes of the Decay 
of Christian Piety, The Art of Contentment. The authorship of The Whole Duty of 
Man has been ascribed to her by Sir James Mackintosh, Sir John Pakington, and 
others. 

Sir William Dugdale, 1605-1686, was one of the great English 
antiquaries. In consequence of his extraordinary proficiency and labor 
in this department of letters, he was knighted by Charles I., and made 
Garter King-at-Arms. 

Dugdale's greatest work, Monasticon Anglicanum, 3 vols., fol , is next to Doomsday 
Book in value as a register of ancient titles, civil and ecclesiastical. A new edition of 
it was published in 1817-30, containing two hundred and forty-one views of Monas- 
teries, Abbeys, Priories, and other ecclesiastical edifices. The cost of the engravings 
alone was six thousand guineas. "The annals of the press, in no country in Europe, 
can boast of a nobler performance ; whether on the score of accuracy and fulness of 
intelligence, or of splendor of paper, type, and graphic embellishments." — Dibdiii. 
gome of Dugdale's other great woi'ks are: The Baronage of England, 2 vols., fol.; The 
Antiquities of Warwickshire, fol.; The History of St. Paul's Cathedral, fol.; The His- 
tory of Embanking and Draining of Divers Fens and Marshes, fol., etc., etc. 

BiCHAED Atkvns, 1615-1677, published, in 1664, a work on The Original and Growth 
of Printing in England, which is of some value, as it was made from original materials 
gathered from the public records of the kingdom. But the attempt therein made to 
rob Caxton of the glory of being the first English printer was not successful. The 
question has been forever settled in Caxton's favor. 



III. V\rRITERS OF THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH. 

Bishop Hall. 

Joseph Plall, T>. D., 1574-1656, an eminent scholar and 
divine, was educated at Cambridge, and rose through vari- 
ous ecclesiastical preferments to be Bishop of Norwich. 

On the establishment of the Commonwealth, Hall lost his prefer- 
ments, and was reduced to straitened circumstances. His writings are 
very numerous, chiefly religious and theological, and are held in high 
estimation. They have been published in 12 vols,, 8vo. 

TTor-A-.?. — The following are the chief: Satires, wTitten in his youth; Epistles; 
Contemplations upon the Principal Passages in the New Testament; Explications of 
all the Hard Texts of the Whole Divine Scriptures ; Christian Meditations ; Episcopacy 
by Divine Right; The Old Religion and the New, or The Difference between the ]{e- 
formed and the Romish Church ; Mundus Alter et Idem, a satiincal work, written in 
Latin. 



EPISCOPAL WRITERS. 169 

"The first professed English satirist is Bishop Hall. His satires are marked with a 
classical precision to which English poetry had yet rarely attained. They are replete 
with animation of style and sentiment. The indignation of the satirist is always the 
result of good sense. Nor are the thorns of severe invective unmixed with the flowers 
of pure poetry. The characters are delineated in strong and lively coloring, and their 
discriminations are touched with the masterly traces of genuine humor. The versifi- 
cation is equally energetic and elegant, and the fabric of the couplets approaches to 
the modern standard." — Warton. 

" The Contemplations of Bishop Hall are among his most celebrated works. They 
are prolix, and without much of that vivacity or striking novelty we meet with in 
the devotional writings of his contemporary [Jeremy Taylor], but are perhaps more 
practical and more generally edifying." — Hallam. 

" He was not uncommonly called our English Seneca, for the pureness, plainness, 
and fulness of his style. Not unhappy at controversies, more happy at comments, 
very good in his characters, better in his sermons, and best of all in his meditations. 
A witty poet when young, a painful preacher and solid divine in his middle, a patient 
sufferer in his old age." — Thomas Fuller. 



Uslier. 

James Usher, 1580-1656, is one of the most distinguished 
names in the annals of the English Church. 

Career. — Usher was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and after 
filling various ecclesiastical ofiices was made Bishop of Armagh and 
Primate of Ireland, in 1624. During the civil war Usher took sides 
with the King, and preached a number of very bitter sermons at Ox- 
ford against the Presbyterians and Independents. After the King's 
overthrow, Usher was obliged to leave Oxford, and his property in 
Ireland was confiscated. His popularity and personal qualities, how- 
ever, obtained for him the position of preacher of Lincoln's Inn. Such 
was Usher's fame for learning that Richelieu is said to have ofiered 
him a high position in France, with protection in the exercise of his 
religion. Cromwell also entertamed the greatest respect for Usher's 
scholarship, and had him interred in Erasmus Chapel in Westminster 
Abbey, with the full service of the Church of England. 

WorJcs. — Usher's works are niiraerous, and were regarded by his contemporaries 
as marvels of research. It may be said of the majority of them, however, that the 
growth of knowledge has thrown them decidedly into the shade. They are written 
mostly in Latin. The best known are his Veterarum Epistolarura Hibernicarum Syl- 
loge, a collection of documents illustrative of the Ancient Irish Church, his Britan- 
nicarum Ecclesiasticarum Antiqnitatcs, a history of the British Church from the 
earliest times, his Original of Bishops, his Be Homan.'e Ecclesiaj Symbolo, his .■\nuals 
of the Old Testament, and his Sacred Chronology, published posthumously. These hist 
two were for a long time the standards of ecclesiastical chronology, and are even still 
followed in the marginal dates inserted in the Authorized Version of the English Bible, 
15 



170 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Usher's Chronology. — Whatever merit this work may once have possessed has 
long since vaiiislied. Usher's chronology is completely superseded by the investiga- 
tioDS of modern science. The system has now no value except a historical one, serv- 
ing as a landmark in the progress of science. 

Usher himself was jjersonally a man of the most amiable, happy temperament, but 
it may be questioned whether his works do not evince more extent of reading than 
judgment in deciding and originality in investigating. 

Fuller. 

Thomas Fuller, 1608-1661, the ecclesiastical historian of 
Great Britain, is about as much known for his wit as for his 
learning. 

Fuller's voluminous works on church history, mstead of being the 
dull, heavy reading that such works usually are, abound in a quaint, 
epigrammatic wit that makes them in a high degree entertaining and 
hvely. 

Fuller was a graduate of Cambridge, and was noted from boyhood 
for his scholarship. He entered the University at the age of twelve, 
took his Bachelor's degree at sixteen, the Master's at twenty, and was 
chosen Fellow at twenty-three. He was noted also for his eloquence 
as a pulpit orator. In the controversy between the Parhament and 
the King, he took the loyahst side. 

WorTis. — His principal works are the following : The Church History of Great 
Britain, from the Birth of Christ to 1648, fol. ; History of the Worthies of England, 
fol. ; The Holy and the Profane State, fol. ; The History of the Holy War : Good Thoughts 
in Bad Times ; Good Thoughts in Worse Times ; Mixed Contemplations in Better Times ; 
Andronicus, or the Unfortunate Politician ; David's Heinous Sin, a Poem, &c. 

Character of his "Works. — The- Church History is perhaps too gos- 
sipy for the dignity of the subject, but it is at least not dull. The 
Worthies is a collection of biographies, often from origmal sources, 
and is a storehouse of valuable knowledge. The Holy and Profane 
State is likewise mainly biographical, — the first part, or Holy State, 
giving historical examples for imitation, and the second part, or Pro- 
fane State, giving examples to be avoided. All his writings give evi- 
dence of varied learning, and all have the peculiar, epigrammatic turn 
already noticed. He has been censured by some for want of sound 
judgment as a historian. The criticism has some foundation. At the 
same time, it is hard to read a page of his writings and not to give him 
credit for entire honesty and good faith. 

" His Worthies is, we believe, more generally perused than any of his productions, 
and is perhaps the most agreeable ; suffice to say of it, that it is the most fascinating 
storehouse of gossiping anecdote, and quaintness; a most delightful raedley of inter- 



EPISCOPAL WRITERS. 171 

changed amusement, presenting entertainment as varied as it is inexhaustible. His 
Good Thoughts in Bad Times, and lesser works, are all equally excellent in their way, 
full of admirable maxims and reflections, agreeable stories, and ingenious moraliza- 
tions. It wad, however, in biography that Fuller excelled." — London Retrospective 
Review. 

"Fuller was incomparably the most sensible, the least prejudiced great man of an 
age that boasted of a galaxy of great men. In all his numerous volumes on so many 
different subjects, it is scarcely too much to say that you will hardly find a page in 
■which some one sentence out of every three does not deserve to be quoted for itself as 
a motto or as a maxim. Fuller, whose wit (alike in quantity, quality, and perpetuity, 
surpassing that of the wittiest in a witty age) robbed him of the praise not less due 
to him for an equal superiority in sound, shrewd, good sense, and freedom of intel- 
lect." — Coleridge. 

Jeremy Taylor. 

Jeremy Taylor, D. D., 1613-1667, is, by general consent, 
one of the greatest glories of the English pulpit. 

Career. — Taylor was born and educated at Cambridge, where his 
father was a barber. In the fierce conflicts then going on, it was in 
keeping with the whole bent of Taylor's mind that he should side with 
the Royalists. He adhered to their party accordingly, and shared 
their fortunes. He was chaplain to Laud and to Charles L, and Fel- 
low of All Souls' College, Oxford. On the downfall of the Royalists, 
he was not only deprived of his offices and emoluments, but frequently 
imprisoned. During the Protectorate, he kept school, for a time, in 
Wales, and officiated as chaplain to the Earl of Carberry. At the 
Restoration, he came m with his party, and was made Bishop of 
Down and Connor, in Ireland. He became also a member of the 
Privy Council of Ireland, and Vice-Chancellor of the University of 
Dublin. His diocese was a troublous one, owing to the alienations and 
heart-burnings between the Catholics and the Protestants, and his life 
consequently was full of vexations and distresses. Yet amid all the 
turmoil of the times, and of his own position, he maintained a cheer- 
ful serenity of soul, worthy of the lofty ideal which he has pictured in 
his writings. 

Character of his Writings. — Jeremy Taylor is the Spenser of theo- 
logical literature. He has the same boundless affluence of imagination 
as Spenser, the same tendency to rambling discursiveness in style, par- 
donable for the many exquisite nooks and corners of thought to which 
it so often leads, the same veneration for kingly and ecclesiastical 
pomp and state. It seems a pity that Taylor could not have been born 
half a century earlier, and formed, with Spenser and Sidney, a part of 
the retinue of the stately Elizabeth. His writings, certainly, if grouped 



172 MILTON AND HIS CONTE MPOE ARIES. 

at all, belong genericallj to the same class as The Fairj Queen, The 
Arcadia, and The Defence of Poesie. 

Worlis. — While in his seclusion in Wales, Taylor wrote his best known works: 
Holy Living, Holy Dyiug, Liberty of Prophesying, The Great Exemplar, or a life of 
Christ, and a collection of prayers, called The Golden Grove. Ilis pen, however, was 
always busy, and liis writings are enough to fill several large folios. They have been 
published, with a life by Heber, in 15 vols., 8vo. 

"These works were not of the kind which an ingenious person, with a sufficient 
command of words, may produce almost at will ; they almost all involved careful re- 
search and reflection. His studies and writings ranged over the whole field of theol- 
ogy. There is hardly a doctrinal point on which he has not expressed an opinion, 
generally one which marks him as beyond his age in vigor and independence of 
thought." — London Quarterly Revie.w. 

" The work of Taylor's, which is, on the whole, most original and characteristic, is 
undoubtedly the ' Liberty of Prophesying,' his great plea for freedom in the forma- 
tion and expression of opinion. In other works Taylor did but adorn forms of litera- 
ture which were common before his time; but in his plea for toleration he is epoch- 
making; few had risen to that height of contemplation at which the fainter lines 
vanished from the surface of the ecclesiastical world — none had expressed with so 
much vigor and eloquence the thoughts of a large and charitable heart on the divi- 
sions of Christendom. In ages to come, Taylor's fame will, perhaps, rest even more 
on his ■ Liberty of Prophesying ' than on his incomparable sermons. 

" In resjject of his similes, Taylor is the very Homer of preachers. His style is com- 
monly metaphorical and allusive, but here and there, when he hits upon an image of 
unusual beauty, he seems unwilling to leave it with a mere touch, and elaborates it 
into a distinct and glowing picture. Sometimes his similes are wrought out from an 
anecdote in some recondite book, and these certainly, however they may adorn, do 
not render the subject more easy of apprehension to an ordinary intelligence: but the 
more beautiful are those Avhich are drawn from natui-al objects. He evidently de- 
lighted in the varied beauty of country scenes ; the sky and the clouds, the woods and 
vales and streams, the ever-new phenomena of the growth and decay of plants, filled 
his soul with admiration and love. 

" The following comparison, illustrating the blessing of God's chastisements, which 
seems to us nearly perfect in all its parts, is besides worthy of note from the fact that 
Southey transferred it entire to 'Thalaba': 

" ' I have known a luxuriant vine swell into irregular twigs and bold excrescences, 
and spend itself in leaves and little rings, and afford but trifling clusters to the wine- 
press, and a faint return to the heart which longed to be refreshed with a full vin- 
tage ; but when the Lord of the vineyard had caused the dressers to cut the wilder 
plant and make it bleed, it grew temperate in its vain expense of useless leaves, and 
made account of the loss of blood by return of fruit.' 

" Here is Southey's version : • 

" ' Repine not, my son, the old man replied. 
That Heaven has chastened thee ! Behold this vine ! 
I found it a wild tree, whose wanton strength 

Had swoln into irregular twigs 
And bold excrescences, 
And spent itself in leaves and little rings ; 
So in the flourish of its wantonness 

Wasting the sap and strength 



EPISCOPAL WEITEES. 173 



That should have given forth fruit. 

But when I pruned tlie i3laut, 
Then it grew temperate in its vain expense 
Of useless leaves, and knotted, as thou seest, 
Into these full clear clusters, to repay 

The hand that wisely wounded it.' " — Lon. Quarterly Review. 

" The sermons of Jeremy Taylor are far, indeed, above any that had preceded them 
in the English Church. An imagination essentially poetical, and sparing none of the 
decorations which, by critical rules, are deemed almost peculiar to verse ; a warm tone 
of piety, sweetness, and charity ; an accumulation of circumstantial accessories when- 
ever he reasons, or persuades, or describes ; an erudition pouring itself forth in quota- 
tion till his sermons become in some places almost a garland of flowers from all other 
writers, and especially from those of classical antiquity, never before so redundantly 
scattered from the pulpit, distinguish Taylor from his contemporaries by their degree, 
as they do from most of his successors by their kind. His sermons on the Marriage 
Eing, on the Home of Feasting, and on the Apples of Sodom, may be named without 
disparagement to others wliich, perhaps, ouglit to stand in equal place. But they are 
not without considerable faults, some of which have just been hinted. The eloquence 
of Taylor is great, but "it is not eloquence of the highest class : it is far too Asiatic, too 
much in the style of the declaimers of tha fourth century, by the study of whom he 
had probably vitiated his taste. His learning is ill-placed, and his arguments often as 
much so; not to mention that he has the common defect of alleging nugatory proofs. 
His vehemency loses its effect by the circuity of his pleonastic language ; his sentences 
are of endless length, and hence not only altogether unmusical, but not always re- 
ducible to grammar. But he is still the greatest ornament of the English pulpit up 
to the middle of the seventeenth century." — Hallam's Lit. Hid. nf Europe. 



Bishop Pearson. 

John Pearson, D. D., 1612-1686, a learned Bishop of the 
Church of England, acquired lasting fame by his Exposi- 
tion of the Creed, which has become a standard text-book 
in theological literature. 

Career, — Bishop Pearson passed tliroiigk a, great variety of ecclesi- 
astical and academic dignities wliich it is not necessary here to enu- 
merate. His theological works are numerous, but he is now known 
almost exclusively by the one already named, An Exposition of the 
Creed. This has attained the rank of a classic in theological lit-era- 
ture, and is studied as a text-book in most theological schools of the 
Episcopal Church. Pearson on the Creed and Hooker's Ecclesiastical 
Polity usually stand on the same shelf. 

" A standard book in English divinity. It expands beyond the literal purport of 
the Creed itself to most articles of orthodox belief, and is a valuable summary of ar- 
guments and authorities on that side. The closeness of Pearson, and his judicious 
selection of proofs, distinguish him from many, especially the earlier, theologians. 
Some might surmise that his undeviating adherence to what he calls the Church is 

15* 



174 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

hardly consistent with independence of thinking ; but, considered as an advocate, he 
is one of much judgment aud skill. Such men as Pearson and Stillingfleet would 
have been conspicuous at the bar ; which we could not quite affirm of Jeremy Taylor." 
— Hallains Lit. Hist of Europe. 

Cudworth. 

Ralph Cudworth, 1617-1688, a very learned theologian 
of the English Church, is chiefly kno^vn by his great work, 
The Intellectual System of the Universe. 

Character and Career. — Cudworth was educated at Cambridge, and 
held various appointments there, and in the church, and he published 
several treatises, in addition to the one named, besides leaving several 
important works in manuscript. Cudworth's Intellectual System Avas 
directed against the atheistical systems of Hobbes and others. He was 
remarkable for his candor as a disputant ; indeed, he set forth the po- 
sitions and arguments of his opponents with so much clearness and 
force, that many zealots censured him for betraying the truth, and in- 
timated that the arguments against religion which he first brought for- 
ward on behalf of its enemies were stronger than those which he after- 
wards adduced of his own to upset them. Truth would be the gainer 
if she had more such right-minded champions. 

Barro^AT. 

Isaac Barrow, D. D., 1630-1677, was very highly distin- 
guished both as a mathematician and a theologian. 

Position and Works. — Barrow was made Professor of Mathematics 
in Cambridge, then Master of Trinity, and finally Yice-Chancellor of 
the University. His mathematical works, treatises of geometry, conies, 
spherics, and optics, are in Latin. His theological works, which are 
in English, first appeared in 3 vols, folio. They consist of Treatises on 
the Pope^s Supremacy and on The Unity of the Church, and Sermons. 
The latter contain expositions of the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, the 
Decalogue, and the Sacraments. 

No Sermons in the English language have received a more general verdict for almost 
eveiy kind of excellence of which such compositions are susceptible, than those of Dr. 
Barrow. 

" As a writer, he is equally distinguished by the redundancy of his matter, and by 
the pregnant brevity of his expression ; but what more peculiarly characterizes his 
manner, is a certain air of powerful and of conscious facility in the execution of what 
he undertakes. Whether the subject be mathematical, metaphysical, or theological, 
he seems always to bring to it a mind which feels itself superior to the occasion ; and 



EPISCOPAL WRITERS. 175 

which, in contending with the greatest diflBculties, puts forth but half its strength." 
— Dugald Steicart. 

In reference to his thoroughness in treating a subject, King Charles used to call him 
"an unf-iir preacher, because he exhausted every topic, and left no room for anything 
new to be said by any one who came after him." 

His Wit. — For a man of such profound learning and such general sobriety of 
views, Barrow was remarkable for the quickness of his wit. Meeting Rochester, one 
day, the witty peer said, " Doctor, I am yours to the shoe-tie." Barrow instantly re- 
plied, " I am yours to the ground." Rochester: "I am yours to the centre." '"My 
lord, I am yours to the antipodes." Rochester, determined not to be outdone : "Doc- 
tor, I am yours to the lowest pit of hell." "There, my lord, I leave you," and he 
turned on his heel and left the scorner. 

He was as ready at a repartee in Latin as in English One instance of hi.s wonderful 
readiness occured at his examination for orders. The prelate was propounding the 
customary questions in turn to the candidates for ordination. When the question 
come to Barrow, Quid est Fides? he replied promptly. Quod non vides. The dignitary 
exclaimed "Good !" The next question was. Quid est spes? to which, as before, Bar- 
row at once replied, Nondum res. " Better yet ! " was the exclamation. Quid est Can- 
tasf Ah, magister, id est raritas ! "Best of all! It must be either Erasmus or the 
Devil ! " 

John Cosix, D. D., 1594-1672, a learned Bistop of the English 
Church, wrote several works, chiefly devotional : A Collection of Pri- 
vate Devotions, compiled at the request of Charles I. ; A Scholastical 
History of the Canon of Holy Scriptures ; History of Transubstantia- 
tion ; Notes on the Book of Common Prayer. 

John WrLMAMS, D. D., 1582-1650, Archbishop of York, attained 
some celebrity in his day as a theological writer. 

Williams was a native of Wales, and was educated at Cambridge. He siicceeded 
Bacon as Lord Keeper of the Great Seal ; was tried for betraying the King's secrets, 
fined £10.000. and imprisoned three years and a half in the Tower, a political perse- 
cution probably; afterwards resumed his seat in the House of Lords, and finally be- 
came Archbishop of York. He took an active part against Laud's innovations in 
religious matters. His chief publication was. The Holy Table, Name and Thing, more 
Anciently, Properly, and Literally used, under the New Testament, than that of Altar, 
4to. It elicited a fierce assault from Peter Heylin, and a sharp controversy ensued. 

Griffith Williams, 1589-1672, was born near Caernarvon, Wales, and educated at 
Oxford. He became Dean of Westminster, and of Bangor, and afterwards Bishop of 
Ossory. While the Presbyterians had the upper hand in Parliament, Bishop Williams 
had to flee, but at the Restoration he returned, and recovered his bishopric. He pul)- 
lished The Great Antichrist Revealed, folio, the antichrist being the " Assembly of 
Presbyterians consulting at Westminster; " also. Seven Treatises, folio; Description 
and Practice of the Four Most Admirable Beasts, 4to; The Right Way to the Best 
Religion, etc. 

Peter Heyltx, D.D., 1600-1662, a learned divine of the English Church, educated 
at Oxford, who took part with the royalists, was deprived by the republicans, and 



176 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOR AEI ES . 

agaiu reinstated in his ecclesiastical dignities on the restoration of the Stuarts. His 
writings are very numerous, and are mostlj' historical and polemical. Thirty-seven 
of his publications are enumeiated. The tullowiug are some ot tlieni : History of the 
Reformation of the Church of Scotland, fol. ; History of the Iteforniation of the Church 
of England, fol. : History of the Presbyterians, fol. ; Life and Death of Archbishop 
Laud, fob, etc. 

" Heylin in his history of the Puritans and the Presbyterians blackens them for 
political devils. He is the Spagnolet of history, delighting himself Avith horrors at 
which the painter himself must have started. He tells of their oppositions to mon- 
archical and episcopal government, their innovations in the church, and their embroil- 
ments of the kingdom. The sword rages in their hands ; treason, sacrilege, plunder; 
while more of the blood of Englishmen had poured like water within the space of four 
years, than had been shed in the civil wars of York and Lancaster in four centuries." 
— Disraeli's Curiosities of Literature. 

Henrt Hammond, D.D., 1605-1660, was a learned and eloquent divine, belonging to 
the royalist party in the quarrel between the Parliament and the King, and was 
ejected from his livings on the ascendency of the former. At the Restoration, he had 
the promise of a Bishopric, but death cut off his expectations. The following are 
his principal works : Paraphrases of the Old, and Annotations on the New Testament; 
Paraphrases and Annotations on the Psalms ; Paraphrases and Annotations on the 
first ten Chapters of Proverbs ; A Practical Catechism ; Sermons, etc. 

William Chillingworth, 1602-1664, a learned divine of the Church of England. 
His works have been printed in folio, and are in great repute among Pi-otestants. The 
one best known and most popular is The Religion of Protestants a Safe Way of Sal- 
vation. 

John Bramhall, D.D., 1593-1663, Archbishop of Armagh, was a zealous theologian 
of the English Church. His Life and Works were printed first in folio, and afterwards 
in 5 vols. 8vo. They were mostly controversial, part being directed against Hobbes's 
theory of Liberty and Necessity, and part in vindication of Episcopacy. Works : A 
Defence of True Liberty; Castigation of Mr. Hobbes's Last Animadversions; A Vin- 
dication of the Church of England; Schism guarded against, etc. 

John Gauden, D. D., 1605-1662, was a Bishop of the English Church in the time of 
the Stuarts. He wrote several pieces on the subjects at issue between the Parlia- 
mentarians and the Royalists, and is believed by many to have been the author of the 
famous Ikon Basilike, generally attributed to King Charles. The discussion in regard 
to the authorship of this piece has been hot, and can hardly yet be considered closed, 
though the preponderance of opinion now is in favor of the kind-hearted old Bishop. 

Wtlltam Gouge, D. D., 157.5-1653, a clergyman of the English Church, "for forty- 
five years the laborious, the exemplary, the much-loved minister of St. Anne's, Black- 
friars, where none ever thought or spoke ill of him but such as were inclined to think 
or speak ill of i-eligion itself." — Granger. He was one of the famous Westminster 
Assembly of Divines, in 1643. He was also one of those who were opposed to the exe- 
cution of Charles I. His M'orks are : Explanation of the Lord's Prayer, 4to; Domes- 
tical Duties, fol.; The Whole Armor of God, fol.; God's Three Arrows, 4to; Com- 
mentary on the Hebrews. 2 vols. fol. The work last named contains the substance of 
nearly a thousand sermons preached in course on Wednesday evenings through a 
period of thirty years. 



NON-CONFORMIST WRITERS. 177 

Rev. Thomas Gouge, 1605-1681, a clergyman of the English Church, celebrated for 
his active benevolence. He was a zealous promoter of the gospel among the Welsh, 
and equally zealous in giving religious instruction to the children in Chrisfs 
Hospital, London. "There have not, since the primitive times of Christianity, beeu 
many among the sons of men to whom that glorious character of the Son of God 
might be better applied, that he went about doing good. And Wales may as worthily 
boast of this truly Apostolical man as of their famous St. David." — Archbishop Tillot- 
sm. He published The Principles of the Christian Religion Explained; The Young 
Man's Guide to Heaven; A Word to Sinners and a Word to Saints; The Surest Way 
of Thriving (by giving to the poor), etc. ; also, a biography of his father, Dr. William 
Gouge. 

Herbert Thorndike, 1672, studied at Cambridge, and finally became Master 

of Sidney College. In consequence of his political views he was ejected during Crom- 
well's administration, but was restored by Charles I. His works are chiefly religious 
and doctrinal, and some of them have become quite rare. The best known, per- 
haps, are a Discourse of the Rights of the Church in a Christian State, and a 
treatise on the Holy Eucharist. Thorndike was a staunch upholder of church estab- 
lishment. 

Henry More, D. D., 1614-1687, a learned divine of the English Church, who could 
not be tempted from his studious retirement by either ecclesiastical or University pre- 
ferment. He was a devout admirer of Plato, and his works are strongly tinctured 
with Platonistic sentiments. Of his works not in Latin the following are the chief: 
Philosophical Poems; The Mystery of Godliness; Confutation of Astrology; Exposi- 
tion of the Seven Epistles to the Seven Churches of Asia, etc. 

William Claggett, D. D., 1646-1688, a clergyman of the Church of England. He 
wrote several theological works : A Discourse on the Holy Spirit, in reply to Owen ; 
An Answer to the Dissenters' Objections to Common Prayer ; Extreme Unction ; Para- 
phrase and Notes on the first chapter of John. 



IV. NON-CONFORMIST WRITERS. 

Baxter. 

Richard Baxter, D. D., 1615-1691, one of the leadiDg 
Non-conformist divines, is said to "have preached more ser- 
mons, engaged in more controversies, and written more 
books, than any other Non-conformist of the age," which is 
saying a good deal, as they were all voluminous writers. 

Amount of his Labors. — " The best method of forming a correct 
opinion of Baxter's labors for the press is by comparing them with 
those of some of his brethren who wrote a great deal. The works of 
Bishop Hall amount to 10 vols., 8vo ; Lightfoot's extend to 13 ; Jeremy- 
Taylor's to 15 ; Dr. Goodwin's would make about 20 ; Dr. Owen's ex- 
tend to 28 ; Baxter's, if printed in a uniform edition, would not be coni- 

M 



178 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOR AEIES. 

prised in less than sixty volumes." This is an evident exaggeration. 
Orme's edition, published in 1830, and considered the standard edition, 
is in 23 vols., 8vo. 

Of this immense mass, the greater part has gone into oblivion. It was not, indeed, 
like the writings of some voluminous authors, ponderous, curious matter, meant only 
for the learned few, but it related to the living issues of the times, and was addressed 
to readers at large. But those issues themselves mostly have passed away, and with 
them the literature of the occasion has ceased to exist except as a part of history. 

Two of Baxter's works, however, are a signal exception to this remark. These are 
The Call to the Unconverted, and The Saints' Everlasting Rest. These two small 
treatises have passed through countless editions, and have continued to form a part 
of the religious literature of the English speaking race all over the world, and doubt- 
less will do so to the end of time. Baxter was one of the busiest men of his time, and 
one of the most influential. But he is at this day, probably, exerting a wider iuiiu- 
enr.e by these two little books than he did while living by all his multiplied labors. 

Owen. 

John Owen, D. D., 1616-1683, is generally considered 
the greatest of the Puritan divines. 

Career. — Owen was educated at Oxford, and during the Protectorate 
of Cromwell was Yice-Chancellor of the University. At the Restora- 
tion, Owen retired to London, and preached there to a dissenting con- 
gregation. Having impaired his health by excessive study, he 
removed for change of air into the country, first to Woburn, and after- 
wards to Ealing, where he died. 

Of all the eminent Non-conformists of that day, none perhaps was 
more respected by those of the opposite party. While at the head of 
the University, he comported himself with such moderation towards 
the Episcopalians that he is said to have been as much beloved by them 
as by his own party. Lord-Chancellor Clarendon, on coming ii^to 
power, ofiered Owen immediate preferment if he would conform, and 
at the death of the illustrious "Dissenter" more than sixty of the no- 
bility of the realm followed him to his grave. 

Sis Works. — Owen was a man of great learning, and his industry was prodi- 
gious. His works fill twenty-four volumes large octavo. The two of most enduring 
character are the Commentary on the Hebrews, and the work on The Holy Spirit. 
Some of his other treatises are, On the Person of Christ; the Doctrine of the Saints' 
Perseverance; A Display of Arminianism, &c. 

Style. — Owen did not cultivate the graces of style, but there is always robustness 
and strength in his argument. He discussed whatever subject he undertook as if he 
intended to leave nothing to be said by those who should come after him. With all 
the progress made since his time in the science of criticism and exegesis, no prudent 
commentator, even now, would undertake to expound the Epistle to the Hebrews 
without a constant reference to the work of Owen. In his writings of a practical 



NON-CONFORMIST WRITERS. 179 

character, he had a peculiarity, beyond all the other great writers of liis school, of 
making his pious emotion dependent in all ciises upon some solid scriptural basis. 

" Spiritual life is the vital energy which pervades the morality and the practice 
recommended by Owen. It is not the abstraction of a mystical devotion, like that of 
Fenelon or Law; nor is it the enthusiastic raptui'es of Ziuzendorf; but the evangelical 
piety of Paul and the heavenly affection of John. I'or every practice, mortification, 
and feeling, Owen assigns a satisfactory, because a scriptural, reason. The service 
which he recommends is uniformly a reasonable service ; and to every required exer- 
tion he brings an adequate and constraining motive. In examining the practical 
writings of such men as Hall and Taylor and Tillotson, we miss the rich vein oi 
evangelical sentiment and that constant reference to the living principle of Chris- 
tianity which ai"e nevei' lost sight of in Owen. They abound in excellent directions, 
in rich materials for self-examination and self government ; but they do not state with 
sufficient accuracy the connection between gracious influence and its practical results, 
from which all that is excellent in human conduct must proceed. They appear as the 
anatomists of the skin and the extremities : Owen is the anatomist of the heart. Ho 
dissects it with remai'kable sagacity, tracing out its course and turnings in every path 
that leads from integrity, and marking out the almost imperceptible steps which con- 
duct to atrocious sins." — Onne. 

Bunyan. 

John Bunyan, 1628-1688, is, of all the writers of his 
age, the greatest marveL With only the most limited op- 
portunities of education, he produced a work which is one 
of the greatest classics, not merely of English literature, 
but of all literature, ancient and modern. The Iliad itself 
is not more clearly a work for all time and all men than is 
the Pilgrim's Progress, by John Bunyan, the Bedfordshire 
tinker. 

Character and Career. — Bunyan was an ilHterate tinker, and in 
early life shockingly profane. Being brought under strong religious 
conviction, he abandoned his former way of life, and became ever 
afterwards a most earnest and devoted Christian. The change in his 
religious character reacted, as in such cases it often does, upon his in- 
tellectual development ; and though he never attained to, nor indeed 
aimed at, the character ,of a learned man, he yet became a most pow- 
erful thinker and writer, his topics being limited chiefly to those drawn 
from the Bible and from religious experience, and he is second to none 
in the power of descrii3tion, or in the purity of his English. 

His Skill in Allegory. — In one particular and most difficult depart- 
ment of writing, Allegory, he stands unrivalled, not only in English, 
but in all literature. Shakespeare is not so clearly the first of Drama- 
tists, as is John Bunyan the Prince of Dreamers, His Dream of the 



180 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPOE AEIES. 

Pilgrim's Progress is confessedly the greatest of Allegories, ancient or 
modern ; it has been translated into almost every language that has a 
religious literature of its own, and it probably has been more read, and 
been instrumental of more spiritual good, than any other book, the 
Bible only excepted. Bunyan was a Baptist; but he is a favorite 
among all Protestant denominations. 

Works. — Bunyan wrote many works, the chief one, after The Pilgrim's Progress, 
being his Holy War. Some of his other works are Grace Abounding ; Justification by 
Jesus Christ ; The Holy City, &c. He was imprisoned in the Bedford jail for more 
than twelve years on account of his religion, and wliDe there, wdth no books but his 
Bible and Fox's Book of Martyrs, he wrote his great work, and some others. A com- 
plete edition of his works has been issued, in 6 vols. 8vo. 

Bunyan has been called the Spenser of the unlearned, the Shake- 
speare of the religious world. He did not write for literary glory, but 
solely for the religious instruction of the rude people among whom he 
lived; yet the highest literary authorities have bowed in reverence 
before the wonders of his art. 

"He had no suspicion that he was producing a masterpiece. He could not guess 
■what place his Allegory would occupy in English literature; for of English literature 
he knew nothing. * * * The style is delightful to every reader, and invaluable as 
a study to every person who wishes to obtain a quick command over the English lan- 
guage. The vocabulary is the vocabulary of the common people. There is not an 
expression, if we except a few technical terms of theology, which would puzzle the 
rudest peasant. We have observed several pages which do not contain a single word 
of more than two sj'llables. Yet no writer has said more exactly what he meant to 
say. For magnificence, for pathos, for vehement exhortation, for subtle disquisition, 
for every purpose of the poet, the orator, and the divine, this homely dialect, the dia- 
lect of plain workingmen, was perfectly suflicient. There is no book in our literature 
on which we could so readily stake the fame of the old unpolluted English language ; 
no book which shows so well how rich that language is in its own proper wealth, and 
how little it has been improved by all that it has borrowed. * * * Though there were 
many clever men in England during the latter half of the seventeenth century, there 
were only two great creative minds. One of these minds produced the Paradise Lost, 
the other, the Pilgrim's Progress." — Macaiday. 

"This "wonderful book is one of the few books which may be read repeatedly, at 
diiferent times, and each time with a new and a different pleasure. I read it once as 
a theologian^ and let me assure you there is great theological acumen in the work ; 
once, with devotional feelings ; and once, as a poet. I could not have believed before- 
hand, that Calvinism could be painted in such delightful colors." — Coleridge. 

Ho^ve. 

John Howe, 1630-1705, was, in the opinion of Eobert 
Hall, " the greatest of the Puritan DiviTies." Critics who do 
not accord to Howe so distinguished a place, are yet unani- 



NOIS'-CONFORMIST WRITERS. 181 

mous in considering him one of the greatest of theological 
writers. 

Character and Career. — Howe was educated at Cambridge ; was 
domestic chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, and to Eichard Cromwell ; was 
afterwards ejected for non-conformity, but continued to preach to a 
dissenting congregation. His writings are not so numerous as those 
of Baxter and some others, and they are wanting in grace and elegance ; 
but they are regarded as surpassing those of all other Puritan divines 
in force, and in breadth of views. Kobert Hall says, " I have learned 
far more from John Howe than from any other author I have ever 
read. There is an astonishing magnificence in his conceptions." 

WorJcs. — Howe's works have been published in 8 vols., 8vo. Those best known 
are : The Living Temple ; The Blessedness of the Righteous ; Delighting in God ; The 
Redeemer's Tears; The Redeemer's Dominion over the Invisible World; The Office 
and Work of the Holy Spirit; God's Prescience; The Vanity of this Mortal Life. 

" Possessed of the learning of Cudworth, the evangelical piety of Owen, and the 
fervor of Baxter, with a mind of larger dimensions than what belonged to any of those 
distinguished individuals, everything which fell from his pen is worthy of immor- 
tality. He delights while he instructs, and impresses Avhile he enlightens. His 
Living Temple, The Blessedness of the Righteous, Of Delighting in God, The Re- 
deemer's Tears, are among the finest productions of uninspired genius, and must be 
read with high gratification by every Christian. His style is occasionally rugged and 
inharmonious ; but the sentiment will richly repay the trifling annoyance of its harsh 
and involved structure." — Orme's Bibl. Bib. 

Matthew Poole, 1624-1679, a Presbyterian Non-conform- 
ist, is especially and most favorably known by his Synopsis, 
and his Annotations. 

Poole wrote many other works on the controversial topics of the 
times, but the two which have been named outweigh all the others, 
and are of permanent value. 

Poole's large work, The Synopsis, was itself an abridgment of a work larger stilL 
There had been printed a work in 9 vols, folio, called Critici Sacri, and containing a 
collection, in Latin, of the critical annotations on the Bible of ninety of the most 
celebrated scholars in Europe. Poole undertook to reduce to order this immense 
mass of critical erudition, and made his celebrated Synopsis Criticorum, in 5 vols, fol., 
being a careful digest of the former work, and giving under each chapter and verse 
the best comments to be found in regard to it. Having finished this great work, 
which is even yet in demand among tlieolngians, he made a still further reduction or 
abstract of it in English, for the use of ordinary readers. This otlier and smaller 
work was in 2 vols, fol., and was termed Annotations upon the Holy Bible. Poole did 
not live to complete this latter work, his labors on it ending with Isaiah. The work 
itself, however, was completed by other hands. -• 

IG 



182 MILTON AND HIS CONTE xMPOR A R lES . 

Samuel Eutherford, IGOO-lGGl, was an eminent Scotch Presby- 
terian divine, Principal and Pector of New College, St. Andrew's, and 
commissioner to the Westminster Assembly of Divines, 1643-47. 

Rutherford was a man of great learning, and a large part of bis disquisitions were 
in Latin. His English treatises are specially noted fur their spirituality, and are oftt-u 
quoted by modern writers. The following are the titles of some of them; Trial and 
Triumph of Faith; Christ's Dying and Drawing Sinners to Himself; Covenant of Life; 
Life of Grace ; Religious Letters and Dying "Words. The following are some of his con 
troversial works, in English: Plea for PauFs Presbytrie in Scotland, Lex Rex, or 
The Law and the Prince ; Divine Right of Church Government ; Survey of the Spiritual 
Architect, etc. Several popular volumes have been made in recent times by collecting 
clioice extracts from Rutherford's works on Christian experience. Two may be named : 
Manna Crumbs for Hungry Souls, consisting of Excerpts from the Letters of Rev. 
Samuel Rutherford, by Rev. W. P. Breed, A Garden of Spices, or Extracts from the 
Religious Letters of the Rev. Samuel Rutherford, by Rev. Lewis Dunn. 

Edmund Calaiviy, 1600-1666, was a preacher of much note. 

Calamy was one of the five authors of Smectymuuus (S M, Stephen Marshall ; E C, 
Edmund Calamy; T Y, Thomas Young; M N, Matthew Newcome ; U U S, William 
Spurstowe), a celebrated tract in reply to Bishop Hall's Divine Right of Episcopacy 
He wrote also A Tindication of the Presbyterian Government and Ministry. — Benja- 
min Calamy, 16>6, was a sou of Edmund Calamy, and was celebrated in his day 

as a preacher. He published a volume of Sermons, which went through numerous 
editions. — Edmund Calaait, 1671-1732, was a grandson of Edmund C, and a Non- 
conformist preacher. " He was a very eminent and laborious divine, of a candid and 
benevolent disposition, and moderate with regard to differences of disposition. ' — Dar- 
ling. Works: The Inspiration of the Holy Writings ; The Doctrines of the Trinity: 
A Defence of Moderate Non-Conformity; An Abridgment of Baxter's Life and Times; 
An Historical Account of My Own Life. 

William Twisse, D. D., 1575-1646, was a learned Calvinistic and 
Non-conformist divine, and Prolocutor of the famous Westminster 
Assembly of Divines. 

Twisse was born at Newberry, Berkshire, and educated at Oxford University. Be- 
sides several theological works in Latin, he wrote A Treatise on Reprobation ; The 
Riches of God"s Love unto the A'essels of Mercy Consistent with his Absolute. Hatred 
or Reprobation of the Vessels of Wrath ; The Morality of the Fourth Command- 
ment, etc. 

Stephen Chahnock, 1628-1680, was a Non-conformist of great em- 
inence. 

Charnock's Works have been published in 9 vols. 8vo. The sermons on The Divine 
Attributes are the ones best known. The testimony in regard to the greatness and 
value of this work is of the strongest kind. Dr. Alliboyie., after quoting the opinions 
of fourteen other critics, says for himself: "We have twice carefully studied every 
word of the Discourses on the Attributes, and we consider the work one of the greatest 
of uninspired compositions. We advise the reader, if he have it not, to procure it 
immediately, and read it through ance a twelvemonth for the rest of his life,.'" 



NON-CONFORMIST WRITERS. 183 

Joseph Alleine, 1633-1688, an English Non-conformist minister, and a graduate of 
Oxford, was the autlior of several religious works, the best, and the best known, being 
his Alarm to Unconverted Sinners, which was first published in 1672. It is commonly 
known as " Alieine's Alarm," and is one of the standard works still sold by most of 
the religious publication houses, both in England and America, being slightly mod- 
ernized in form and expression. Immense numbers of it have been printed. Few 
books have been the means of turning so many to righteousness. 

William Bates, D. D., 1625-1699, a Puritan divine of much note, who gave up his living 
on the passage of the Act of Uniformity. His works after his decease were printed in 
a tolio volume. The principal one was The Harmony of the Divine Attributes. It is 
accounted a classic in theology, and is still in demand. " Bates was sometimes called 
•the silver-tongued,' and was reckoned the politest writer, if not the best scholar, 
of the whole body of [disseutiugj ministers." — AUihone. 

George Gillespie, 1648, was one of the Commissioners from the Church of 

Scotland to the famous Westminster Assembly of Divines, in 1643, which formed the 
Catechism and Confession of Faith now in use among all Presbyterians. Mr. Gillespie 
was a man of learning and ability, and a zealous Presbyterian. He published The Ark 
of the Covenant Opened, 2 vols. 4to ; Dispute Against the English Popish Cei-emonies 
obtruded upon the Church of Scotland, 4to ; Dialogue between a Civilian and a Divine 
concerning the Church of England, 4to; Aaron's Rod Blossoming, 4to; and several 
others The work, however, which is now of most value is his Notes of Debates and 
Proceedings of the Westminster Assembly, as it contains important authentic infor- 
mation by an eye-witness of the proceedings of that famous body. 

David Calderwood, 1575-1651, a Scotch divine, was driven into exile for his oppo- 
sition to Episcopacy. His principal work was A History of the Kii-k of Scotland, a 
very learned work, valuable for its documents, but said to be not very pleasant 
reading. 

Joseph Caryl, 1607-1673, a Non-conformist divine, wrote a Commentary on the Boole 
of Job, in 12 vols., 4to. '" The rao^t poyiderous of all the expositions which have been 
published on this part of Scripture." — Orme. 

Henry Burton, 1579-1648, a Puritan divine, who was subjected to fine and impris- 
onment on account of his preaching. Works : Censures on Simony ; The Baiting of 
the Pope's Bull ; Babel No Bethel ; Truth's Triumph over Trent; The Love of the Gos- 
pel; England's Bondage and Hope of Deliverance; Conformity's Deformity. 

Nicholas Byfield, 1579-1652, a Puritan divine, wrote many works, in good repute : 
Exposition of the Epistle to the Colossians ; Essay Concerning the Assurance of God's 
Love and Man's Salvation ; The Marrow of the Oracles of God ; Exposition of the Apos- 
tles' Creed, etc. — Richard Byfield, 1664, half-brother to Nicholas, is likewise one 

of the Puritan preachers and writers. Works : The Light of Faith and Way of Holi- 
ness; Doctrine of the Sabbath Vindicated; The Power of the Christ of God, etc. 

Edward Reynolds, D. D., 1599-1676, a learned Presbyterian divine, was one of the 
famous Westminster Assembly. His works have been published in 6 vols., 8vo. The 
principal ones are A Treatise on the Passions and Faculties of the Soul of Man ; and 
Annotations on Ecclesiastes, written originally for The Assembly's Annotations, and 
forming apart of that work. The others are chiefly sermons. 



184 MILTON AND HIS CONTEMPO R A EIES. 

Henry Aixsworth, D. D., d. 1662, was a leader among the English Independents in 
the sixteenth century, and was banished on account of his religious opinions. His 
principal work is his Annotations on the Psalms, the Song of Solomon, and the Pen- 
tateuch. The Annotations have been highlj' commended, and are often quoted. 

William Bridge, 1600-1670, a Puritan Non-conformist divine of the time of Charles 
I., was a scholarly man, of studious habits, and an industrious writer. A collected 
edition of his works, in 5 vols , was published in 1845. They are chiefly sermons. " He 
was a very close student, rising every morning, both in winter and summer, at four 
o'clock, and continuing in his library until eleven." On the passage of the Act of Con- 
formity, he gave up his living, and went to Rotterdam. Archbishop Laud writes: "In 
Norwich, one Mr. Bridge, rather than he would conform, hath left his lecture and two 
cures, and is gone into Holland." On the margin of this. King Charles wrote, " Let 
him go : we are well rid of him ! " 

Rev. Thomas Brookes, 1680, was an English Independent divine, of some 

celebrity. "An aifecting and useful writer, though homely in his expressions." — 
Darling. Works : The Unsearchable Riches of Christ ; Precious Remedies for Satan's 
Devices; The Mute Christian under the Smarting Rod; A Golden Key to open Hid 
Treasures ; Apples of Gold for Young Men and Women ; The Private Key of Heaven ; 
Heaven on Earth. '"Precious Remedies" went through 60 editions; "Mute Chris- 
tian," 50 editions ; " Apples of Gold," 25 editions. 

Samuel Cl.arke, 1599-1682, a Non-conformist divine. Works : The Marrow of Eccle- 
siastical History, 2 vols, fol.; A General Martyrology, ful.; A Jlirror or Looking-GIass, 
both for Saints and Sinners, 2 vols.; Lives of Sundry Eminent Persons; The Marrow 
of Divinity. — Samuel Clarke, 1626-1700, son of the preceding, wrote a Commentary 
on the Old and New Testament, which is well spoken of; also, some other works. 

Thomas Goodwin-, B. D., 1600-1697, was a high Calvinistic divine, of great learning, 
who gave up his pi'eferments and became an Independent. He lived to be ninety- 
seven years old. His writings were exceedingly numerous. A collection, published 
after his death, and containing only part of his works, fills 5 vols., fol. They are to 
a large extent expository. 

Thomas Manton, D. D., 1620-1677, was a learned Non-conformist divine, educated at 
Oxford. His writings are very numerous and are held in high estimation. They are 
mainly of an expository character. He wrote Commentaries on several of the Epis- 
tles, an Exposition of the Lord's Prayer, and One Hundred and Ninety Sermons on 
the 119th Psalm. 

John Biddle, 1615-1662, has been styled '' The Father of the Eng- 
lish Unitarians." 

Biddle wrote several treatises calling in question the received opinion in regard to 
the Holy Spirit, for which he was imprisoned, and even condemned to death, though 
the latter sentence was not executed. The names of some of his works are A Confes- 
sion of Faith touching the Holy Trinity ; A Brief Scripture Catechism ; A History of 
the Unitarians, &c. 




CHAPTER X. 

Dryden and His Contemporaries. 

The period iucluded in this Chapter embraces the reigns 
of Charles II. and James II., 1660-1688, the final expulsion 
of the Stuarts, the Kevolution of 1688, and the reign of 
William and Mary, 1688-1702. It was, especially in its 
earlier part, a period of great licentiousness of manners, 
which is but too faithfully reflected in much of its poetical 
and all of its dramatic literature. 

The authors of this period are, for convenience of descrip- 
tion, divided into four Sections : 1. Poets, including the dra- 
matic writers, and beginning with Dryden ; 2. Philosoph- 
ical and Miscellaneous winters, beginning Avith Locke; 
3. Theological writers, beginning with Tillotson ; 4. The 
Early Friends, beginning with George Fox. 



I. THEPOETS. 

Dryden. 

John Dryden, 1631-1700, fills a larger space in English 
literature than any other writer between the age of Milton 
and that of Pope and Addison. Dryden is confessedly one 
of the greatest of English poets ; and although there may 
be a question among critics as to his precise rank, his name 
is never omitted in any enumeration of our first-class authors. 
16 * 18o 



18G DRYDEN AND HIS CONTE M PO E A RI ES . 

His Early History, — Bryden was born of an ancient family of the 
name of Driden. The change in the spelling of his name was a fancy 
of his own. His parents were rigid Puritans. He was educated first 
at Westminster, under the famous Dr. Busby, and afterwards at Cam- 
bridge. He was early in life a great admirer of Cromwell, and his 
first poem of any note was Heroic Stanzas on the Late Lord Protector, 
written on the occasion of Cromwell's death. They contain some pas- 
sages in his happiest vein. The following may be quoted : 

" His grandeur he derived from heaven alone, 
For he was great ere fortune made him so ; 
And wars, like mists that rise against the sun. 
Made him but greater seem, not greater grow." 

Dryden, however, always worshipped the rising sun, and on the over- 
throw of the Commonwealth and the restoration of the Stuarts, he 
went over to the winning party and wrote his Astrsea Bedux, a poem 
of welcome to the new order of things. He wrote also A Panegyric 
to his Sacred Majesty King Charles II. 

Career as a Dramatist. — The Eest oration brought the drama again 
into vogue, and Dryden applied himself to writing for the stage. His 
first play, The Wild Gallant, was not successful. His next. The Kival 
Ladies, fared better. The Indian Emperor was a triumph, and the 
author was at once a man of mark. It led, among other things, to his 
marriage to a noble lady, daughter of the Earl of Berkshire. The 
marriage was ill assorted. It brought him neither wealth nor happi- 
ness. When the lady wished herself a book, that she might have more 
of his company, he replied, " Be an almanac, then, my dear, that I 
may change you once a year." He revenged himself for her railing 
by uttering sarcasms on the sex, in his plays. In one of them, for in- 
stance, he says, that '' woman was made from the dross and refuse of 
man," upon which Jeremy Collier wittily remarks, " I did not know be- 
fore that man's dross lay in his ribs : I believe it sometimes lies higher." 
Dryden's plays are twenty-nine in number, and run through thirty-two 
years of his life, — from his thirty-first to his sixty-third year. 

Character of his Plays. — All of Dryden's earlier plays are mod- 
elled after the French drama, which King Charles had made fash- 
ionable. They are in rhyming verse, are occupied solely by heroic 
and exalted personages, and filled with scenes of inflated and incon- 
gruous splendor. When this fashion was at its height, it received a 
rude shock from a lively parody. The Rehearsal, written by the Duke 
of Buckingham. Dryden's plays after this were more natural, and he 



THE POETS. 187 

vrrote them in blank verse, which he formerly had scouted as beneath 
the dignity of the drama. But in all his plays, rhyming or unrhyming, 
heroic or comic, he is fully open to the change of immorality. 

" The female character and softer passions seem to have been entirely bej-ond his 
reach. His love is always licentiousness, his tenderness a mere trick of the stage. 
His merit consists in a sort of Eastern magnificence of style, and in the richness of 
his versification. The bowl and dagger — glory, ambition, lust, and crime — are the 
staple materials of his tragedy, and lead occasionally to poetical grandeur and bril- 
liancy of fancy. His comedy is, with scarce an exception, false to nature, improbable 
and ill-arranged, and subversive equally of taste and morality." — Clmmhers. 

Success as a Satirist. — Dryden may have deserved the ridicule 
thrown upon him in The Sehearsal, and in other satires by Shadwell 
and Little. Eut he retaliated upon his opponents in the poem of Absa- 
lom and Achitophel, with wonderful vigor. The success of this bold 
political satire was almost unprecedented, and placed Dryden above 
all his political contemporaries. " His antagonists came on with in- 
finite zeal and fury, discharged their ill-aimed blows on every side, and 
exhausted their strength in violent and inefiective rage ; but the keen 
and trenchant blade of Dryden never makes a thrust in vain, — never 
strikes but at a vulnerable point." — Sir Walter Scott. 

Religious Poems. — Not long after this, Dryden published a poem 
in quite a difierent vein, Eeligio Laici, to defend the Church of England 
against dissenters. Towards the close of his life he embraced the Cath- 
olic religion, and wrote the Hind and Panther m defence of his new 
opinions. In this poem, the Hind is the Church of Kome ; the spotted 
Panther is the Church of England ; while the Independents, Quakers, 
Anabaptists, etc., are bears, hares, boars, etc. The Calvinists are 
wolves : 

" More haughty than the rest, the wolfish race 
Appears, with belly gaunt and famished face — 
Never was so deformed a beast of grace. 
His ragged tail betwixt his legs he wears, 
Close clapped for shame, but his rough crest he rears, 
And pricks np his predestinating cars." 

Other "Works. — One of Dryden's remarkable poems was his Annus 
Mirabilis, being a poetical account of the events of the year 16G6. 
His latest productions were his poetical versions of portions of Juvenal 
and Persius, and of the jEneid of Virgil. He wrote also, about the same 
time, his Fables, being imitations from Boccaccio and Chaucer. They 
are admirably done, and have been read more than almost any part of 
his works. Very late in life, also, he wrote his Ode to St. Cecilia, the 
loftiest and mo.=t imaginative of all his compositions. 



188 DRYDEX AND HIS COXTEMPOEAEIES. 

Prose "Works . — Dryden excelled in prose almost as much, as in 
poetry. His Essay on Dramatic Poets was the first attempt in English 
at regular criticism, and has received miiversal commendation. His 
other prose works are the pieces written as accompaniments to his 
plays, and consist of prefaces, dedications, and critical essays. " The 
prose of Dryden may rank with the best in the English language." — 
Sir Walter Scott. 

" Without either creative imagination or any power of pathos, he is in argument, in 
satire, and in declamatory magnificence, the greatest of our poets. His poetry, in- 
deed, is not the highest kind of poetry, but in that kind he stands unrivalled and 
unapproached. Pope, his great disciple, who, in correctness, in neatness, and in the 
brilliancy of epigrammatic point, has outshone his master, has not come near him in 
easy flexible vigor, in indignant vehemence, in narrative rapidity, any more than he 
has in sweep and variety of veisification. Dryden never writes coldly, or timidly, or 
drowsily. The movement of verse always sets him on fire, and whate\er he produces 
is a coinage hot from the brain, not slowly scraped or pinched into shape, but struck 
out as from a die with a few stout blows or a single wrench of the screw. It is this 
fervor especially which gives to his personal sketches their wonderful life and force : 
his Absalom and Achitophel is the noblest portrait gallery in poetry." — Crailc. 

His complete works were edited by Sir Walter Scott, in IS vols., Sto. 

Roscomn-ion. 

Wentworth Dillon, Earl of Hoscommon, 1633-1684, a 
native of Ireland, was a nobleman of cultivated tastes and 
great purity of character ; and he holds a respectable place 
among English poets. 

Boscommon wrote Odes, Prologues, etc. ; translated Dies Ir?e, and 
Horace's Art of Poetry ; and wrote an Essay on Translated Verse. 

" It was my Lord Roscommon's Essay on Translated Terse which made me uneasy 
till I tried whether or no I was capable of following his rules and of reducing the 
speculative into practice." — Dryden. 

" He is elegant, but not great ; he never labors after exquisite beauties, but he sel- 
dom falls into grave faults. He improved taste, if he did not enlarge knowledge." — 
Joluison. 

" Roscommon, not more learned than good. 
With manners gracious as his noble blood: 
To him the wit of Greece and Rome was known. 
And every author's merits but his own." — Pope. 

Eoscommon seems to have been about the only writer of his time 
who was thoroughly pure and moral. 



THE POETS. 189 

Orrery. 

Roger Boyle, 1621-1679, Earl of Orrery, and son of the 
"Great Earl of Cork," like most of the noble family to 
which he belonged, cultivated authorship. 

The Eari's -works are rather numerous, but are not accounted as of a very high order. 
They are mostly poetical. The following is a partial list: Tragedies, Heni-y Y., The 
Black Prince, Herod the Great, Triphon, Mustapha, Altemira; Two Comedies, Mr. 
Anthony, and Guzman ; Poems on the Fasts and Festivals of the Church ; Poem on 
the Death of Cowley ; Parlhenissa,, a Romance ; A Treatise on the Art of War. 

Dorset. 

Charles Sackville, Earl of Dorset, 1637-1706, a nobleman of gay 
life and easy manners, wrote a few songs which were very popular, 
and some satires which " sparkled with wit as splendid as that of 
Butler." — Macavblay. 

Dorset's most celebrated song, " To all you ladies now on land," -was -written at sea, 
the night before a naval engagement. He -was liberal and judicious in the use of his 
money among men of letters, and was a general favorite. He -was "an intellectual 
voluptuary, and a master of all those pleasing branches of knowledge which can be 
acquired without severe application." — Macaulay. 

Rochester. 

John Wilmot, Earl of Eochester, 1647-1680, was a gay and profli- 
gate courtier of this period, who was celebrated in his day for his wit, 
and whose life and writings were equally at variance with religion and 
morality. 

Hits Career. — Rochester was educated at Oxford ; travelled on the continent; and 
fought against the Dutch. His recklessness and dissipation at Court brought him 
prematurely to the grave. During his life he was admired as a wit and poet, but on his 
death-bed, being converted by the efforts of Bishop Burnet, he gave strict orders that 
his profane writings shouM be destroyed. Notwithstanding this prohibition, there 
appeared, in 17S0, a volume purporting to be a collection of his poems. Several other 
editions have appeared subsequently. Under the circumstances, it is not possible to 
speak confidently on the genuineness of the collections as a whole. Some of the pieces 
are undoubtedly Rochester's, such as the Imitation of Horace's Satire, Satire against 
Man, Verses upon Nothing. The last is generally considered the best. The poems do 
not sustain their author's reputation, and have little to recommend them to readers 
of the present day. Their obscenity is repulsive, and their so-called wit, although it 
flashes at times, is in the main tedious. 

William Cavsndisr. Duke of Devonshire, 1610-1707. a statesman of high rank, is 
also known as an author. Works : Ode on the Death of Qnecn Mary ; An Allnsion to 
the Bishop of Cambray's Supplement to Homer, a Poem ; Fiagments on the Peerage ; 



190 DRYPEN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Speeches. "He was the friend and companion, and at the same time the equal, of 
Ormoud, Dorset, Roscommon, and all the noble ornaments of that reign of wit in 
which he passed his youth." — Campbell. 

Sir George Etheridge, 1636-1690, was one of those gay and dis- 
solute writers and wits who made the reign of Charles II. both famous 
and infamous. 

Etheridge began studying for the bar, but abandoned the law, and betook himself 
to the drama. lie wrote Tlie Comical Revenge, or Love in a Tub ; She Would if She 
Could, a Comedy; The Man of the Mode, or Sir Fopling Flutter, a Comedy, etc. The 
last wiis his most successful piece. '• It is, perhaps, the most elegant comedy, and 
contains more of the real manners of high life than any one the English stage was 
ever adorned witli."' — Biotj. Dram. " Sir George Etlieridge was as thorough a fop as 
ever I saw ; he was exactly his own Sir Fopling Flutter." — Sjjeiice's Anecdotes. 

Yet this man was knighted, and was sent as British Minister to Ratisbon. After 
a gay evening party given by him at Ratisbon, he is said to have fallen down stairs 
and broken his neck while taking leave of his guests. 

Sir William Killigrew, LLD., 160.5-1693, was an active royalistin the times of the 
Stuarts, and at the Restoration was First Yice-Charaberlain to Charles II. Killigrew 
gave much time to literary pursuits. Among his works are the following: Pandora, 
a Comedy : Selindra, a Tragi-Comedy ; Orniasdes, a Tragi-Comedy ; The Siege of Urbin, 
a Tragi-Comedy ; The Imperial Tragedy ; Midnight and Daily Thoughts, a religious 
work, etc. 



Henry Vaughan, 1621-1695, holds a respectable rank among the 
second-class poets of that day. 

Yaughan was a Welshman, born in Brecknockshire, and had something of the en- 
thusiasm characteristic of liis race. He was bred to the law, but abandoned it for 
physic. In the earlier part of his career he wrote translations from Juvenal and other 
classical authors. Later in life he became deeply religious, and wrote sacred lyrics : 
Silex Scintilians, or Sacred Poems and Private Ejaculations; The Mount of Olives, or 
Solitary Devotions ; Flores Solitudinis, or Certain Rare and Eloquent Pieces. "He is 
one of the hardest even of the inferior order of the school of conceit : but he has some 
few scattered thoughts that meet our eye amidst his harsh pages, like wild flowers 
on a barren heath." — Campbell. This verdict of Campbell's does scant justice to 
Yaughan. He certainly holds a respectable rank in the second class of sacred poets. 

Joseph Beaumont, D. D., 1615-1699, an eminent poet and scholar of his day, long 
since forgotten, was King's Professor of Divinity, and Master of St. Peter's College, 
in Cambridge. His Psyche, or Love's Mystery, in twenty-four cantos, displaying the 
Intercourse betwixt Christ and the Soul, is a curiosity of literature, being the longest 
poem in our language. It contains 38,922 lines, " being considerably longer than the 
Fairy Queen, nearly four times the length of Paradise Lost, and five or six times as 
long as the Excursion." It was written "for the avoiding of mere idleness," as the 
task he "might safeliest presume upon, without the society of l)ooks," the Pu itans 
having driven him from his fellowship at Cambridge. The bulk of it was written in 
less than a year, 1647-8, and then published. A second edition, revised, with four new 




THE POETS. 191 

cantos, vras published in 1702. Pope said : " There are in it a great many flowers well 
worth gathering, and a man who has the art of stealing wisely, will find his account 
in reading it." 

Some of Beaumont's Minor Poems, English and Latin, were published in 1749. Tliey 
have great merit, or rather there are some very fine bits among them. Both volumes 
are now scarce . 

Nicholas Brady, 1659-1726, an English clergyman, was the author of a translation 
of Yirgil's ^Eneid into English verse, but is chiefly known by his Tersion of the 
Psalms of David, made in conjunction with Nahum Tate. Tate and Brady was for 
many generations of Englishmen the only hymnal known in their church service. It 
did a good work in its day, and had some poetical merit, notwithstanding the abun- 
dant ridicule which has been thrown upon it, and the general contempt into which it 
has now fallen. (See article on Hymnody, p. 135.) 

JoHX PoMFEET, 1667-1703 ; studied at Cambridge and took orders in the Church of 
England. Pomfret is the author of a few poems, one of which. The Choice, was very 
popular in its day, bitt has since gone almost wholly out of fashion. It is slightly 
praised by Johnson, whereas Hallam speaks of it as intolerable in its tame and frigid 
monotony. 

Rev. Thomas Creech, 1659-1700, is known in literature by his translations from the 
Latin poets. He translated Lucretius and Ilorace, and portions of Theocritus, Ovid, 
Juvenal, and Plutarch. His translations are not generally ranked very high. He 
committed suicide, in a fit of insanity, it is supposed. 

John Philips, 1676-1708, "the poet of the English vintage" {Macaulay) wrote a 
poem in two books. On Cider, in imitation of the Georgics of Virgil ; a mock-heroic 
poem, Splendid Shilling, in imitation of the blank verse of Paradise Lost : and a poem 
called Blenheim. The poem On Cider is more remarkable for its scientific accuracy 
than for its poetical beauty, while that on The Splendid Shilling gives pain bj'^ its ap- 
plication of the higli-sounding phrases of Milton to common and vulgar topics. 

Thomas Brown, 1663-1704-, a facetious jjoet, commonly called Tom Brown, was noted 
equally for his skill in languages and his ribaldry. He lives in literary history, not 
from any inherent merit in his works, but solely because he is often named or referred 
to in the works of Addison, Dryden, and others of good repute. 

Dramatic Writers. 

Thomas Otway, 1651-1685, was a dramatic writer of con- 
siderable note, contemporary with Dryden. 

Otwav was educated at Oxford. He began as an actor in London, 
but, not meeting with much success, betook himself to writing plays, 
partly original, partly translations or imitations from the French. 

Many of Otway's plays were very successful at the time, but only two have main- 
tained their reputation among readers and actors of the present day^ viz. : The Orphan, 
and Venice Preserved. Otway was improvident by nature, and died young In very 
indigent circumstances. His untimely fate was his own fault, rather than that of his 



192 DRYDEN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

friends. The Orphan and Venice Preserved abound in affectinp; and eloquent passages 
that touch the sensibilitiej more directly, perhaps, than Shakespeare's di-amas. But 
tliey have not that subtle individuality of character and expression which stamp 
Shakespeare's creations as a class by themselves, Otway is merely affecting ; he does 
not reveal to us a new world of thought and seiitinient. 

"This [The Orphan] is one of the few plays that keep possession of the stage, and 
hds pleased for almost a century, through all the vicissitudes of domestic fashion. 
Of this play nothing new can easily be said. It is a domestic tragedy drawn from 
middle lii'e. Its whole power is upon the affections ; for it is not written with much 
comprehension of thought or elegance of expi'ession. But, if the heart is interested, 
many other beauties may be wanting, yet not be missed. 

"A tragedy [Venice] which still continues to be one of the favorites of the pulili*', 
notwithstanding the want of morality in the original design and the despicable scenes 
of vile comedy with which he has diversified his tragic action. . . . The work of a 
man not attentive to decency nor zealous for virtue, but of one who conceived 
forcibly, and drew originally, by consulting nature in his own breast." — Dr. Johnson. 

Thomas Shadwei,l, 1640-1692, is a well-known dramatic writer 
of this period, 

Shadwell was educated at Cambridge, and abandoned the bar for the drama. In 
1688 he was crowned poet laureate. Dryden ridiculed him severely in his Mac Flecknoe. 
Shadwell had some slight poetic ability and some wit, but was unable to finish pieces 
thoroughly. And not only were his plays defective; they were gross and indecent 
even in that age of license. Among them are The Humorists, The Libertine, The 
Virtuoso, Timon of Athens, The Lancashire Witches, The Squire of Alsatia, Bury Fair, 
&c. The Volunteers exposed the knavery of the dealers in stocks. Nahum Tate and 
Shadwell are ranked by Southey as the lowest of the poet laureates. 

Nathaniel Lee, 1658-1691, was a dramatist of some note, his noto- 
riety being gained, however, as much by the irregularities of his life 
as by his genius. 

Lee was a native of Hertfordshire, and was educated at Camhridge. Not successful 
as an actor, he turned his attention to play-writing. He was the author of eleven 
dramas, all tragedies but one. Owing to his habits of intemperance he became insane, 
was for a time in Bedlam, and was finally killed in a street-brawl. Lee was much 
lauded by some of his cotemporaries, Dryden, for instance; and has since been merci- 
lessly condemned for his bombast and extravagance. The sounder opinion seems to be 
that Lee as a writer was full of faults, but also was a man of decided poetical talents, 
and that he might have produced works of lasting merit, had he only learned to 
restrain his imagination. The most popular of his dramas are Alexander, and Theo- 
dosius or The Force of Love. 

Sir Charles Sedley, 1639-1701, a gay courtier and wit of the reigns of Charles IT. 
and James II., wrote the following plays : The Mulberry Garden, Antony and Cleopa- 
tra, Bellamira, Beauty the Conqueror, The Grumbler, The Tyrant King of Crete, besides 
numerous Songs and other short poems. He was in great repute in his day as a man 
of letters, biit is now little known. His writings partake of the general licentiousness 
of his age, though not to such a degree as some. 

Richard Flecknoe, 1680, a dramatic poet in the time of Charles II. He wrote 

some plays and poems, but nothing worthy of record, and he has his place in liter- 
ature because only of the scourgings given him in the satires of Dryden and Pope. 



PHILOSOPHICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 193 

John Banks, a poijular dramatic writer during the latter part of the seventeenth 
century. Some of liis plays, running from 1677 to 169G, are the following: Rival 
Kings, Destruction of Troy, Virtue Uetrayed, Island Queens, Unhappy Favorite, In- 
nocent Usurper, and Cyrus the Great. "His style gives alternate specimens of vulgar 
meanness and of bombast. But even his dialogue is not destitute of occasional nature 
and pcithos ; and the value of his works as acting plays is very considerable." — Kniijht. 

Mrs. Aphra Behn, 1689, was of a good family by the name of Johnson, in the 

city of Canterbury. Her father being appointed Governor of Surinam, Aphra became a 
resident of that country, and while there became acquainted with the native prince, 
Oroonoko, whose story she afterwards gave in a novel of that name. On returning to 
England, she was married to Mr. Behn, an eminent Dutch merchant of London, and 
so became conversant with Dutch affairs. King Charles II. having formed a high 
opinion of her abilities, from conversations with her in regard to the colony of Surinam, 
sent her to Antwerp, in the secret service of the Government, during the progress of 
the Dutch war. She had a lover living at Antwerp, through whom she learned 
important state secrets, which she communicated to her Government. Mrs. Behn pub- 
lished three volumes of poems, consisting of songs and other short pieces. She wrote 
also seventeen plays, and translated several works from the French and the Latin. 
She was the author of Letters between a Nobleman and his Sister, and of Eight Love 
Letters, the latter being addressed to a gentleman whom she passionately loved, and 
with whom she corresponded under the name of Lj^cidas. "The licentiousness of 
Mrs. Behn's pen is a disgrace to her sex and to the language." — AUibone. 

II. PHILOSOPHICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 

Locke. 

John Locke, 1632-1704, is one of the names always 
quoted in speaking of the great thinkers who have largely 
influenced the current of English opinion on science, mor- 
als, or religion. 

His Career. — Locke was the son of a captain in the Parliamentary 
army. After passing through the Westminster School and Oxford 
University, he applied himself to the study of medicine, in which 
science he acquired no little proficiency. His skill in prescribing for 
the treatment of Lord Ashley (afterwards Earl of Shaftesbury), in a 
critical disease, led to a lifelong intimacy with that nobleman and his 
family, Locke became thenceforward a permanent member of his 
lordship's household, and the tutor of his young son, afterwards cele- 
brated as the author of The Characteristics. Locke shared in the po- 
litical odium attached to his noble patron, and was obliged at one time 
to secrete himself on the continent to avoid being arrested on the sus- 
picion of treasonable practices. At the Revolution, in 1668, lie 
returned to England with other members of his party, and in the same 
fleet that brought over WiUiam and Mary. He received appointments 
17 - N 



194 DRYDEN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

under tlie new Government which yielded him a competent support, 
but his health failing he gave up his offices in 1700, and passed the 
four remaining years of his lite in retirement at the family seat of his 
friend Sir Francis Masham. 

Locke's writings are numerous, and are of various kinds, according 
to the varieties of experience of his life. 

Political Writings. — By the circumstances of his life he was thrown 
into connection with the statesmen to whom the public affairs of the 
nation were subjects of controlling practical interest. His thoughts 
consequently were much occupied with questions of this kind, and 
though not a professed political writer, in the sense of being a partisan, 
he yet wrote several treatises on political subjects. Among these may 
be named his celebrated Letters on Toleration, givmg views in regard 
to political liberty much in advance of his times ; Two Treatises on 
Government ; On Interest and The Value of Money ; On Coining Sil- 
ver Money ; On Raising the Value of Money, etc. 

Eeligious and Educational. — Being a devout Christian, Locke wrote 
On the Eeasonableness of Christianity, on Miracles, A Paraphrase and 
Notes on the Epistles to the Bomans, Corinthians, Galatians, and 
Ephesians, and other works of a religious and devotional kind. He 
wrote also Thoughts concerning Education, a treatise which, though 
containing some things now ascertained to be impracticable, has yet 
many valuable suggestions, and is an important part of the literature 
of that subject. 

His Great Work. — The great work of Locke's life, however, was An 
Essay concerning the Human LTnderstanding. He was occupied with 
this, at intervals, for eighteen years. It gave him rank as a philoso- 
pher and metaphysician of world-wide celebrity, causing his name to 
be associated with those of Bacon and Newton as leaders of human 
thought. 

The theory which Locke undertook to explode was the old doctrine 
of innate ideas, and the theory which he proposed in its place was that 
all human knowledge begins with sensation. This theory, wdiich for a 
time obtained almost universal ascendency, has been materially modi- 
fied since his day, and he himself is no longer acknowledged as a 
leader in any school of philosophy. But he did a great service by his 
unanswerable refutation of many errors which up to that time held 
undisputed sway, and by the example which he gave of a more rational 
way of treating metaphysical subjects. 

Locke's Essay, on account of the freshness and vigor of its style, 



PHILOSOPHICAL J?ND MISCELLANEOUS. 195 

held its place as a text-book in institutional of learning much longer 
than it otherwise would have done. While he makes no pretence to 
ornament, and never runs into smooth phrase or rounded periods, he 
avoids most sedulously the uncouth and abstruse jargon of the older 
writers on metaphysics, and aims everywhere to make his meaning 
plain and obvious to the common understanding. His diction is that 
of the common people, his illustrations are drawn from common life. 
His book, even in the abstrusest parts of it,, is entertaining. 

Boyle. 
Hon. Eobert Boyle, 1627-1691, son of the "Great Earl 
of Cork," is greatly distinguished as an experimental phi- 
losopher, of the school of Bacon, and as the chief founder 
of the Royal Society. 

Character and Life. — Boyle was a very devout man, and though 
strongly tempted to enter into political life, he steadily declined, and 
gave himself entirely to the cultivation of science and the practice of 
religious duties, and at his death he bequeathed a fund for the endow- 
ment of an annual course of lectures in defence of the Christian reli- 
gion. These lectures began in 1692, one hundred and eighty years ago. 
Many of them have been printed. They form a valuable series of 
works on the evidences of Christianity. Mr. Boyle himself wrote 
several works of the same sort, and studied the Hebrew and Greek 
languages for the sake of qualifying himself better to write on this 
subject. 

He was a man of such a devout and reverent character that he 
would never utter the name of God in conversation without first 
making a slight but perceptible pause. His chief labors and writings 
were in the line of experimental philosophy. He was the principal 
founder of the Royal Society, and was offered the Presidency of it, but 
he declined the honor, as he repeatedly declined the peerage. He was 
never married, but lived in London with his sister, Lady Ranelagh, 
whom lie survived only a week. Boyle belonged to the same school 
of philosophy as Bacon, and may be considered indeed as intellectually 
the successor and heir of the latter. In reference to the fact that Boyle 
was born on the day that Bacon died, it was well said: Sol occuhult; 
nox nulla secuUt est (The sun has set; but no night followed). 

TFor'fe*. — After Boyle's death, his works were collected and piihlished in 5 vols., 
fol. His principal works, exclusive of those of a purely scientific character, are the 
following: Seraphic Love; Considerations upon the Style of the Holy Scriptures; Oc- 
casional Reflections ; A Discourse of Things above Reason ; A Free Inquiry into the 



196 DRYDEN AND HIS C^NTEMPOK A RIES. 

Tulgarly receivfd Notion of Nature; A Free Discourse against Customary Swearing; 
On the High Veneration Man's Intellect Owes to God; The Recoucileableness of 
Reason and Keligion. 

" No one Englishman of the seventeenth century, after Lord Bacon, raised to him- 
self so high a rejjutation in experimental philosophy as Robert Boyle." — Hallam. 

" As a philosopher he conferred advantages on science which place him in the same 
rank with Bacon and Newton." — Cunningham. 

"Some of the most striking and beautiful instances of design in the order of the 
material world, which occur in the sermons preached at the Boyle Lectures, are bor- 
rowed from the works of the founder." — Dugald Stewart. 

Temple. 

Sir William Temple, 1628-1699, a well-known English 
diplomatist, attained distinction as a writer. 

Career, — Temple studied at Cambridge, and afterwards travelled on 
the continent in company with his tutor, Dr. Ealph Cudworth. Tem- 
ple entered upon political life and rose to distinction. His chief ser- 
vices were the negotiation of the Triple Alliance between England, 
Holland, and Sweden, in 16G8, the treaty of peace between England 
and Holland, and the marriage between William, Prince of Orange, 
and the Princess Mary of England. Temple finally abandoned politics 
and retired to his country-seat of Moor Park. Here he had, for a 
number of years, as private secretary. Swift, who was then a young 
man unknown to fame. 

WorJcs. — Temple's works fall into two classes, his Memoirs and his Miscellanies. 
The former consist chiefly of letters and autobiographical essays. The latter comprise 
his detached essays on various topics. One of them, the Essay on Ancient Learning, 
has attained considerable notoriety from the circumstance that its author was totally 
unfamiliar with the subject, and betrayed his ignorance. Temple's chief merit con- 
sists in his style, which has received the almost universal praise of critics. 

"Next to Dryden, the second place among the polite writers of the period from the 
Restoration to the end of the century has commonly been given to Sir William Tem- 
ple. His Miscellanies, to which principally this praise belongs, are not recommended 
by more erudition than a retired statesman mitiht acquire with no great expense of 
time, nor by much originality of reflection. But, if Temple has not profound knowl- 
edge, he turns all he possesses well to account ; if his thoughts are not very striking, 
they are commonly jtist. He has less eloquence than Bolingbroke, but is also free 
from his restlessness and ostentation. Much also which now appears superficial in 
Temple's historical surveys was far less familiar in his age; he has the merit of a 
comprehensive and a candid mind. His style, to which we should particularly refer, 
will be found in comparison with his contemporaries highly polished, and sustained 
with more equability than they have preserved, remote from anything either pedantic 
or humble. The periods are studiously rhythmical ; yet they want the variety and 
peculiar charm that we admire in those of Dryden." — Hallam. 



PHILOSOPHICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 197 

Algernon Sidney. 

Algernon Sidney, 1621-1683, is known chiefly on politi- 
cal grounds. 

Sidney was distinguished for his enlightened and republican princi- 
ples. Being convicted of treason, and executed, on an accusation 
which was afterwards proved to be false, he became in the popular 
estimation a martyr, and his name has been invested with a halo of 
glory. He belonged to a noble family, and he was himself a man of 
elegant culture and manners. He wrote Discourses on Government, 
containing his political views, Letters, and an Essay on Love. 

" In all the Discourses of Algernon Sidney upon Government we see constant indi- 
cations of a rooted dislike to monarchy and an ardent love of democracy : but not a 
sentence can we find that shows the illustrious author to have regarded the manner in 
which the people were represented as of any importance." — Brougham. 

Evelyn. 

John Evelyn, F. R. S., 1620-1705, is chiefly known by 
his Sylva, or a Discourse on Forest Trees. 

" Evelyn's Sylva is still the manual of British planters, and his life, 
manners, and principles, as illustrated in his Memoirs, ought equally 
to be the manual of English gentlemen." — Walter Scott. Evelyn was 
a man of elegant culture, and both in his life and writings maintained 
a singular purity of character, the more noticeable on account of the 
general dissoluteness of manners of the age in which he lived. He 
was married at the age of twenty-six to a girl not yet fourteen, the 
daughter of the English ambassador in Paris. Evelyn's plan seems 
to have been to marry the young lady first, and educate her after- 
wards. She writes of him after his death : 

" His care of my education was such as might become a father, a lover, a friend, and 
a husliand, for instruction, tenderness, affection, and fidelity, to the last moment of 
his life, which obligation I mention with a gratitude to his memory ever dear to me ; 
and I must not omit to own the sense I have of my parents' care and goodness in 
placing me iu such worthy hands." 

Evelyn was one of the earliest members of the Royal Society ; his 
work on forest trees was written at their request, and was the first 
work published by them. It was written in view of the rapid destruc- 
tion and disappearance of the forest trees in England, and of the im- 
portance of maintaining a proper amount of timl:)er on the island, in 
order to the naval supremacy of the nation. The work Avas a season- 
able one, and it seems to have had the desired effect. 
17 s;- 



198 DRYDEN AXD HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

" Inquire at the Admiralty how the fleets of Nelson have been constructed, and thoy 
can tell you that it was with the oaks which the genius of Evelyn planted." — Disraeli. 

Evelyn's other works are numerous. The following are the chief: Sculptni;e. a His- 
tory of the Art of Engraving: Terra, a Philosophical Discourse on Earth ; A Paralh-l 
of the Ancient Architecture with the Modern : Acetaria, a Discourse of Sallets; Fumi- 
fugium, or The Inconvenience of the Air and Smoke of London Dissipated: Numis- 
mata, a Discourse of Metals, etc., etc. 

Ray. 

John Ray (Wraj), 1627-1704, attained distinction as a 
naturalist. 

Career. — Eav was the son of a blacksmith ; he studied at Cam- 
bridge, and was admitted to orders in the Church of England. In 
1662 he refused to sign the Act of Uniformitr, and resigned his felloAV- 
ship. In company with his friend and patron, Willoughbv, he trav- 
elled on the continent for three years, making scientific investigations. 
He was made a Fellow of the Eoyal Society in 1667. 

Ray was a man of considerable general learning and ability, but is chiefly known 
as a naturalist. Nearly all his works, which are very numerous, are on natural-his- 
tory topics. The greatest of them are his Universal History of Plants, and his Syn- 
opsis of Quadrupeds and Serpents. Ray's contributions to the study of botany and 
zoology are extremely valuable. He was the first fairly to establish the great dinsion 
of plants into monocotjiedonons and dicotyledonous, and of animals into those with ■ 
and those without blood. Cuvier pronounces him " the first true systematist of the 
animal kingdom." Traces of his influence are everywhere visible in the works of 
LinnfBUS, Buffon, and others. Besides his strictly scientific works, Ray published a 
small collection of English Proverbs and an account of his Travels on the continent. 

John Wallis, D. D., 1616-1703, is the author of the first EnglLsh 
Grammar published. 

Wallis was eminent as an astronomer and a mathematician, was Professor of Geom- 
etry at Oxford, and Keeper of the University Archives. He was Secretary to the 
Westminster Assembly of Divines, and also afterwards was one of the divines ap- 
pointed on the Presbyterian side, in the Savoy Conference of 1661, to revise the Book 
of Common Prayer. Wallis published many works of a scientific character, mostly 
in Latin. He is connected with English literature only by the feet that he wrote on 
English Grammar, 1653. Even this is in Latin, but as it was the first attempt, of any 
moment, to reduce the laws of the English language to system and rule, and as this 
treatise contains the germ of most that has since been accomplished in this line, it 
deserves at least this passing notice. 

Sa^iuel Pepys, 1632-1703, has a permanent place in literature, by 
virtue of his Diary, which was not known to be in existence until more 
than a century after his death, and which was not published in full 
initil a few vears ago. 



PHILOSOPHICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 190 

Pepys was a native of London, and -was educated at Cambridge. For a number of 
years he was secretary to the Lords of Admiralty. Pepys published during his life- 
time two works that are not without value : Portugal History in 1667 and 1G68; and 
jMemoirs on the State of the Royal Navy. But these works are completely over- 
sliadowed by Pepys's immortal Diary. This unique work lay for more than a century, 
in shorthand MS , unknown, in the Pepysian library of Magdalen College. It was 
deciphered and published, but only in a mutilated fornij in 1825. In 1849 appeared a 
fuller edition, but even this leaves much to be desired. The time covered by this diary 
is from 1G.59 to 16C9. The work is one of intense interest to all who are interested iu 
English literature and history. The writer seems to have seen everybody, and gone 
everywhere, was an interminable gossip, and an indefatigable searcher after odds and 
ends. The style is quaint aud garrulous, enlivened with the most cheerful naivete. 

•'The best book of its kind in the English language. . . . Pepys is marvellously 
entertaining: the times and the man peep out in a thousand odd circumstances and 
amusing expressions. . . . The ablest picture of the age in which the writer lived, 
and a work of standard importance in English literature." — London Athenitmn. 

Sir Eogee L'Esteaxge, 1616-1704, -^as a political writer ^'\\o de- 
fended Avitliout scruple all tlie enormities of the Court of Cliarles 11. 
and James II., and was rewarded by being knighted and made Licenser 
of the Press. 

He " was by no means deficient in readiness and shrewdness ; and his diction, though 
coarse, and disfigured by a mean and flippant jargon which then passed for wit in the 
greenroom and the tavern, was not without keenness and vigor. But his nature, at 
once ferocious and ignoble, showed itself in every line that ho penned."' — Macaulaij. 

Besides his political and controversial pieces, he translated a large number of works, 
chiefly from the ancient classics: ^I^sop's Fables; Selieca's Morals ; Cicero's OflSces ; 
Erasmus's Colloquies. Josej^hus, Quevedo's Tisions, etc. The Queen, who had a great 
contempt for him, made the following anagram on his name, which perhaps did him 
no injustice : 

"Roger L'Estrange, 
Lying strange Roger." 

Edward Chambeklatne, LL. D., 1616-1703, Avas a political and miscellaneous writer. 
The Present "War Parallelled; England's "Wants ; Angliaj Xotitia, or The Present State 
of England; A Dialogue between an Englishman and a Dutchman, concerning the 
last Dutch War: The Converted Presbyterian; An Academy or College, wherein 
Young Ladies and Gentlemen may, at a very moderate expense, be educated in the 
Christian religion, etc. — Johx Chamdeklayxe, d. 1723, son of Edward, was distin- 
guished as a linguist, being acquainted with ten different languages. The Anglia3 
Notitia, begun by the father, was continued by the son. He wrote also Dissertations 
on the Memorable Events of the Old and New Testaments, and translated a large 
number of works from the French aud Dutch. 

Sir Samckl Morland, 1625-1693, was an accomplished scholar in the times of Oliver 
Cromwell and the Stuarts. He held high positions, and was distinguished for his me- 
chanical genius and inventions. Of his literary works, the one which is of most note 
is The History of the Evangelical Churches in the Valley of Piedmont, fol. It is often 
referred to, and is a standard authority on that subject. 



200 DRYDEN AXD HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Sir George Mackenzie, 1636-1691, a native of Dundee, educated at Aberdeen and 
St Andrew's, held several high judicial and political appointments in Scotland. Sir 
George is the author of many works and essays which were held in high repute at one 
time, but have since fallen into disfavor and neglect. The best known are: Eeligio 
Stoica, Moi-al Gallantry, Jus Regium, a defence of absolute monarchy. On the Discov- 
ery of the Fauatick Plot, and Memoirs of the History of Scotland. Sir George's treat- 
ment of his subjects is commonplace, and his style affected and pedantic. 

Sir Egbert Atkyns, 1621-1709, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer under William 
HI., and for some time Speaker of the House of Commons, was the author of several 
learned treatises on Parliamentary law: An Inquiry into the Power of Dispensing 
with Penal Laws; I'he Power of Jurisdiction and Privileges of Parliament ; The True 
and Ancient Jurisdiction of the House of Peers ; The Jurisdiction of the Chancery in 
Causes of Equity. Also two pamphlets in defence of Lord Russell. — Sir Robert At- 
kyns, 1647-1711, son of Sir Robert, was the author of a work entitled "The Ancient 
and Present State of Gloucestershire," — a large folio, beautifully printed and adorned 
with pictures of scenery and of the seats of the nobility and gentry. 

John Eachard, D. D., 1636-1697, Master of Catharine Hall, Cambridge, was noted as 
a writer for the keenness of his ridicule, though as a preacher he was dull and prosy. 
He wrote Hobbes's State of Nature Considered, in a dialogue between Pliilautus and 
Timothy ; The Grounds and Occasions of the Contempt of the Clergy ; Non-Conform- 
ing Preachers, etc. Hobbes, though full of conceit and impervious to direct argu- 
ment, was very sensitive to Eachard's ridicule. 

"I was in company with Hobbes when he swore and cursed, and raved like a mad- 
man at the mention of Dr. Eachard's Timothy and Philautus." — Dr. Hides. 

"I have known men happy enough at ridicule, who, upon grave subjects, were per- 
fectly stupid; of which Dr. Eachard, of Cambridge, who wrote The Contempt of the 
Clergy, was a great instance." — Swift. 

Joseph Glanville, 1636-1680, a learned clergyman of the Church of England, was a 
scientific man, an active member of the Royal Society, and an advocate of the Aristo- 
telian philosophy. Yet he believed firmly in witchcraft, and published several trea- 
tises to prove its truth, and regarded as sceptics and Sadducees those who were other- 
wise minded. His principal works are : Blow at Modern Sadduceeism, on Witches and 
yritchcraft; Sadducismus Triumphans, or a Full and Plain Evidence concerning 
Witches and Apparitions ; Plus Ultra, or the Progress of Knowledge since Aristotle ; 
Scepsis Scientifica, or Confessed Ignorance the Way to Knowledge, etc., etc. "The 
whole work is strongly marked with the features of an acute, an original, and, in mat- 
ters of science, a somewhat sceptical genius ; and when compared with the treatise on 
witchcraft, by the same author, adds another proof to those already mentioned of the 
possible union of the highest intellectual gifts with the most degrading intellectual 
weakness." — Dugald Stewart. 

George Hickes, D. D., 1612-1715, educated at Oxford, and made Dean of Worcester, 
was deprived for i-efusing to take the oath to AVilliam and Mary. Hickes was one 
of the most learned men of his time, and inflexible in his religious principles. He 
published several theological writings, but is best kno\^Ti by his contributions to the 
study of Anglo-Saxon and Old English. His two great M^orks are Institutiones Gram- 
maticas Anglo-Saxonicje, &c., and Linguaruin Veterum Septentrionalium Thesaurus, 
&c., containing extracts from original A. S. manuscripts now lost. 



PHILOSOPHICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS. 201 

AxDR']:w Fletcher, of Saltoun, 1653-1716, was a Scottish statesman of high cluvr ic- 
ter, and in great respect for his parliamentary eloquence and his zealous champiun- 
sliip of the rights of the people. A collection of his Discourses and Speeches has 
been published. One sentiment of his is often quoted. It occurs in a letter to the 
Marquis of Montrose : " I knew a very wise man that believed that if a man were per- 
mitted to make all the ballads, he need not care who should make the laws of a 
nation." 

Thomas Buknet, 1635-1715, gained great distinction by the publication of a philo- 
sophical treatise in Latin, on The Sacred Theory of the Earth. He translated it into 
English with alterations and additions. Its scheme of geology is utterly absurd, — 
was so even with the dim light then possessed on this subject; yet the treatise found 
many readers, and even some disciples, on account of the extreme beauty of its style. 

James Drake, M. D., 1667-1707. was a political writer, whose publications produced 
considerable ferment. His History of the Last Parliament, 1702, and Historia Anglo- 
Scotica, gave great offence to the Government, and were burnt by the common hangman. 

Roger Palmer, Earl of Castlemain, 1705, ambassador from James II. to the 

Pope, was the author of several works: The Present War between the Yenetians and 
the Turks; The Late War between the English and Dutch in Savoy; Apology fur the 
Papists, &c. 

Sir Thomas Pope Blouin-t, 1649-1697, eldest son of Sir Henry Blount, was a member 
of the House of Commons, and for many years commissioner of accounts. He pub- 
lished a book in Latin, which was a soi-t of Dictionary of Authors, Including those of 
all nations: Censura Celebriorum Authorum — A Critique on the most celebrated 
Authors. Also, A Natural History, and a volume of Essays on Poetry, Learning, 
Education, etc. 

Charles Blount, 1654-1693, a gentleman of good birth and education, son of Sir 
Henry Blount, published several works of an infidel tendency, Anima Mundi, Great 
is Diana of the Ephesians, William and Mary Conquerors, etc. He was a man of irreg- 
ular desires, and he ended his life by suicide. 

Capt. William Dampier, 1 652 , a famous old navigator, was the author of Dam- 
pier's Voyage Round the World, 4 vols., 8vo, etc, 

Robert Brady, 1643-1700, wrote several historical works, the chief of which is A 
Complete History of England, 3 vols., folio. This work is highly commended for its 
accuracy. Hume is said to have drawn upon it largely for the materials of his work. 

John Aubrey, 1627-1697, has no little notoriety as an antiquary. 

Aubrey's Miscellanies was published in 1696, and is full of the supernatural. Trans- 
portation in the Air, Blows Invisible, Converse with Angels and Spirits, etc., etc. Most 
of his antiquarian works were left in MS., but have since been published. Perambu- 
lation of the County of Snrrey, appeared in 5 vols., 1725. His Collection for Wilts was 
published in 1821, his Lives of Eminent Men in 1813. His cliaracter as an antiquary 
is in dispute, some critics counting him half crazed and unworthy of credit, others 
believing him credible in his account of whatever passed under his own observation, 
though not to be trusted in his conjectures. Some of the most interesting of the 
alleged facts in the early life of Shakespeare depend upon Aubrey's testimony. 



202 DEYDEN AND HIS COXTEMPOE A RIES . 

Elias Ash3I0LE, 1617-1693, was an antiquarian of great celebrity. 

Ashinole"s principal works, besides some Latin treatises on Chemistry and Natural 
pliilosopliy, were History of Berkshire in 3 vols, folio, and History of the Order of the 
Garter. The last-named work was one of immense research, and won for him great 
applause. "It was his greatest undertaking, and had he published nothing else, 
would have preserved his memory, as it certainly is, in its kind, one of the most val- 
uable books in our language." — Chalmers. He made a famous collection of coins, 
medals, and other curiosities, w^hich with his books and MSS. were bequeathed to the 
University of Oxford, where they constitute the nucleus of the Ashmolean Museum. 

Anthoxy a Wood, 1632-1695, has great celebrity as the kistorian 
of Oxford University. 

Wood was born and educated there, receiving his degree of M. A. in 1655 ; and he spent 
the remaining forty years of his life in recording the history of the institution and 
of those who had been connected with it. As a writer, he lacked taste and skill; he 
was thoroughly prejudiced, never losing an opportunity to laud a high churchman or 
a Catholic, or to snub a Roundhead or a Presbyterian, or a poet ; yet withal so indus- 
trious and painstaking a collector of facts that his works are invaluable, constituting 
the main storehouse for the materials of the early history of English literature. Hia 
works were two ; The Historj' and Antiquities of the Colleges and Halls in the Uni- 
versity of Oxford, 4td ; and Athenfe Oxonienses, an exact history of all the writers 
and bishops who have had their education at Oxford, giving their birth, fortune, pre- 
ferments, and the fate and character of their writings, 2 vols., fol. 



III. THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 

Tillotson. 

John Tillotson, D. D., 1630-1694, was greatly distin- 
guished as a pulpit orator. His Sermons were considered 
the highest models of pulpit eloquence ; and though not now 
held in so great estimation as they once were, they still have 
an honored place in English literature. 

Tillotson was born of Puritan stock, but early left the Presbyterians 
and conformed to the Church of England. He was educated at Cam- 
bridge, and rose through a long series of promotions until he became 
Archbishop of Canterbury. He is universally esteemed as one of the 
great lights of the English Church. His special distinctions were his 
moderation and good sense as an ecclesiast, and his eloquence as a 
preacher. His reputation in the latter point was prodigious during 
his life, and for one or two generations after his decease. His col- 
lected works, chiefly Sermons, have been frequently printed, formerly 
in 3 vols., foHo, latterly in 12 vols., 8vo. 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 203 

" Tillotsoii's liighest flights -were indeed far below those of Taylor, of Barrow, and of 
South ; but his oratory was more correct and equable than theirs. His style is not 
brilliant ; but it is pure, transparently clear, and equally free from the laxity and 
from the stiffness which disfigure the sermons of some eminent divines of the seven- 
teenth century. The greatest charm of his compositions, however, is derived from the 
benignity and candor which appear in every line, and which show forth not less con- 
spicuously in his life than in his writings." — MacauLay. 

South. 

Kobert South, D. D., 1633-1716, is generally regarded as 
the most eloquent preacher of his day. 

South was educated, first at the Westminster School, under the 
famous Dr. Busby, then at Oxford. He was University Orator in 1660, 
and afterwards obtained some valuable preferments in the Church. He 
was, a zealous Eoyalist and Episcopalian, and waged unsparing war 
upon the Puritans with his tongue and with his pen. South's chief 
distinction was as a preacher. His sermons are masterpieces of vig- 
orous sense and sound English, though not altogether as decorous as 
modern taste requires in pulpit discourses. His works, chiefly ser- 
mons, have been published in 5 vols., 8vo. 

" South had great qualifications for that popularity which attends the pulpit, and his 
manner was at that time original. Not diffuse, not learned, not formal in argument 
like Barrow, with a more natural structure of sentences, a more pointed, though by 
no means a more fair and satisfactory turn of reasoning, Avith a style clear and Eng- 
lish, free from all pedantry, but abounding with those colloquial novelties of idiom 
which, though now become vulgar and offensive, the age of Charles II. affected ; spar- 
ing no personal or temporary sarcasm : but if he seems for a moment to tread on the 
verge of buffoonery, recovering himself by some stroke of vigorous sense and language -, 
such was the witty Dr. South, whom the courtiers delighted to hear." — Hallams Lit. 
History of Euro;pe. 

Edward STiiyLiNGFLEET, 1635-1699, was a learned Bishop of the 
Church of England. 

Stillingfleet was the author of numerous treatises on theological subjects, and after 
his death his Works were published in 6 vols., fol. The most elaborate and important 
were the following : Origines Sacras, or A Rational Acco'ant of the Grounds of Natural 
and Revealed Religion ; Origines Britannicaj, or The Antiquities of the British Churches; 
A Rational Account of the Gi-ounds of the Protestant Religion; Irenicum, A. Weapon - 
Salve for the Church's Wounds, or The Divine Right of Particular Forms of Church 
Government, etc. 

William Beveridge, D. D., 1 637-1708, a Bishop of the English 
Church, was the author of several theological treatises in Latin, and of 
numerous works in English, the latter being chiefly on the practical 



204 DRYDEN AND HIS CONTEMPOPw ARIES. 

duties of religion. He was exceedingly zealous in his work as a Chris- 
tian minister, and has received the title of "the great reviver and 
restorer of primitive piety." The most esteemed of his devotional 
treatises is his Private Thoughts upon Eeligion. His English works 
have been printed in 9 vols., 8vo. 

Bishop 'Ken. 

Thomas Ken, D. D., 1637-1710, a learned and amiable 
Bishop of the Church of England, is especially noted for 
his devotional works. 

The familiar long-metre doxology, " Praise God from whom all bless- 
ings flow," is the composition of this good prelate, being the conclu- 
ding verse of one of his hymns. It is, of itself, sufficient to give him a 
lasting place in the memory of all God's people. 

The following are Bishop Ken's principal works : Poems, Devotional and Didactic ; 
Manual of Prayers ;. Prayers for the Use of all Persons who come to the Baths of Bath 
for Cure ; Practice of Divine Love; Approach to the Holy Altar, etc. Some of Bishop 
Ken's Hymns are exceedingly beautiful, and are so catholic in character, that they 
have been included in the hymnals of nearly all churches. 

Theophilus Gale, 1628-1678, a learned Non-conformist divine, educated at Oxford, 
wrote several works, showing great erudition and industry. The most important was 
The Court of the Gentiles, 5 vols., 4to. 

"This learned and elaborate work, after falling for a time into obscurity, is now in 
great repute. The leading object of it is to turn all human learning, philosophy, and 
religion, to the ancient Scriptures and the Jewish Church." — Orme. 

John Flavel, 1627-1691, an eminent Calvinistic divine, ejected for Non-conformity, 
was a man of very fervent piety and zeal. After being ejected from his church, he 
preached in private houses. His works are on topics of practical religion, and have 
b ien much in demand. They have been published in 6 vols., Svo. Among those which 
have been published as separate treatises are the following: H isbandry Spiritualized ; 
A Saint Indeed; The Touchstone of Sincei-ity ; Personal Reformation; The Method of 
Gi-ace; The Divine Conduct, etc. 

Sykon Patrick, 1626-1707, was a learned Bishop of the English Church, educated 
at Cambridge. His main work was a Commentary on the Old Testament, from Gene- 
sis to the Song of Solomon, inclusive, in 10 vols., 4to. This Commentary is usually 
supplemented by Lowth, Arnold, Whitby, and others, who have written upon the later 
portions of the sacred volume. Bishop Patrick wrote a large number of other works, 
mostly on practical religion. 

Humphrey Prideaux, D. D., 1648-1724, a celebrated theological historian, is known 
phiefly by his Connection of the Old .and New Testaments. This is a ypluuji^oijs work* 



THEOLOGICAL WRITEES. 205 

published originally in 2 vols., folio, taking up the Jewish history where the Old Tes- 
tament ceases, and continuing the story from other sources down to the point where 
the Evangelists take it up in the New Testament. It is a work of great learning, and 
is considered a standard authority on that subject. Some of the other works of Dean 
Prideaux are A Life of Mahomet ; Validity of the Orders of the Church of Eng- 
land, etc. 

Samuel Shuckford, 1754, a learned scholar, and a clergyman of the English 

Church, is chiefly known by his Sacred and Profane History of the World Connected, 
4 vols., 8vo. The work begins with the Creation, and comes down to the dissolution 
of the Assyrian empire and the declension of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, that 
is, to the point where the work of Prideaux begins. It has been received as a stand- 
ard work of its class, though not equal in merit to Prideaux, to which it is intended 
to be a complement. 

Daniel Whitby, D. D., 1638-1726, a learned commentator and theologian of the Eng- 
lish Church, was born in Northamptonshire, and educated at Oxford. He was bred a 
Calvinist, but at the age of sixty four was converted to Arminianism by reading a 
-work of Dr. Clarke's, and thenceforward wrote zealously on that side of the contro- 
versy. He lived to be nearly ninety. The works in the earlier part of his life are 
mainly against the Catholics. His most elaborate work is a Paraphrase and Commen- 
tary on the New Testament, 2 vols, folio. 

Gilbert Burnet, 16+3-1709, was a Bishop of the English Church in the reign of 
William and Mary. Bishop Burnet entered actively into affairs of State, and he bore 
apromitient part in bringing about the Revolution, in 1688. He took the Whig side in 
politics and religion, and was much opposed and criticised by the clergy and writers 
of the Tory and Anglican party. He wrote very voluminously, and his works are in 
high repute among historians and theologians. The following are his principal pub- 
lications: The History of the Reformation of the Church of England, 7 vols., 8vo; 
History of His Own Time, 6 vols., 8vo; An Exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles; 
Lives of James and William, Dukes of Hamilton, of Sir Matthew Hale, the Earl of 
Rochester, and Queen Mary; and a great variety of other works, both of a practical 
and a controversi?il character. 

George Bull, D. D., 16^4-1710, was a learned Bishop of the English Church. His 
most important works are in Latin, and are such as to give him rank among the great 
theologians of all time. In addition to these learned -works, he wrote many things 
which give him a place in English literature, though not commensurate with that 
which he holds as a theologian and a general scholar. His works, Latin and English, 
have been printed in 7 vols., Svo. 

Matthevs^ Henry. 

Matthew Henry, 1662-1714, one of the leading Non-con- 
formist divines of the seventeenth century, is chiefly known 
as a commentator on the Scriptures. 

Henry showed quickness of intellect from his earliest childhood, and 
was equally remarkable for a devout spirit and for the purity of his life. 
He wrote many works, chiefly in the form of Sermons ; but that by 
18 



206 DRYDEN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

which he is most known is his Commentary. This was first published 
in 5 vols., folio. 

Henry's Commentai-y has passed through almost innumerable editions, Loth in 
England and America. The London Religious Tract Society, 1831-1835, published a 
Commentary made up of selections from Henry aud Scott, which had a prodigious sale. 
As a work replete with devout thoughts, often expressed with a peculiar verbal an- 
tithesis which adds to their piquancy and force, Henry's Commentary is unrivalled. 
But the lack of that philological and linguistic knowledge which must be the basis 
of all true biblical comment, and the rise since his time of a different and better style 
of exegesis, have caused his work, with all its merits, to be gradually superseded. 

Thomas Comber, D. D., 1644-1699, was a learned divine. Besides numerous contro- 
versial works, he wrote one of a devotional character, A Companion of the Temple and 
the Closet, which has been a general favorite. He held various ecclesiastical positions, 
and is generally known as Dean Comber, from his having been Dean of Durham. 

Herbert Croft, D.D., 1603-1691, was educated abroad, at St. Omer's, his father being a 
Catholic. Herbert renounced Catholicism, and took orders in the English Church, and 
finally became Bishop. He published a work which led to considerable controversy : 
The Naked Truth, or The True State of the Primitive Church. 

John Edwards, D.D., 1637-1716, was a Calvinistic theologian of the English Church. 
His works were numerous, and were mostly controversial : Theologia Reformata, or 
The Substance and Body of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., fol. ; Authority, Style, and 
Perfection of the Books of the Old and New Testaments, 3 vols., 8vo ; The Preacher, 
8vo ; Evangelical Truths Restored, Svo. 

"Edwards was a voluminous writer, of a controversial spirit, who pointed out and 
endeavored to check the departure from reformation principles in his time, but not in 
the spirit that would commend his sentiments." — Biclcersteth. 

EZEKIEL Hopkins, 1633-1690, was a learned dignitary of the English Church in Ire- 
land, being Bishop of Londonderry. He published a large number of religious and 
theological treatises, which are in high repute: Treatise of the Tanity of the World; 
Exposition on the Lord's Prayer ; Exposition on the Ten Commandments ; Doctrine 
of the Two Covenants ; Doctrine of the Two Sacraments, etc., etc. — Charles Hopkins, 
1664-1699, a son of Bishop Ezekiel Hopkins, wrote several works of a literary charac- 
ter : Epistolary Poems and Translations ; Pyrrhus, King of Egypt, a Tragedy ; Boadi- 
cea. Queen of Britain, a Tragedy ; Friendship Impi'oved, a Tragedy ; The Art of Love, 
etc. — John Hopkins, b. 1675, another son of Bishop Ezekiel Hopkins, also gave evi- 
dence of literary tastes and abilities. The Triumphs of Peace, a Pindaric poem; The 
Victory of Death, a Pindaric poem ; Amasia, or The Works of the Muses, etc. 

Samuel Cradock, 1620-1706, was one of the ejected Non-conformist divines. His 
works are in good repute : Knowledge and Practice ; Harmony of the Four Gospels ; 
The Apostolical History; The Old Testament History Methodized; Exposition of the 
Revelation ; Gosijel Liberty. 

William Assheton, 1641-1711, was the author of several works, mostly of a theo- 
logical character. The following are the principal: Toleration Disapproved; A Sea- 
sonable Yindication of the Blessed Trinity ; The Cases of Scandal and Persecution ; 
The Country Parson's Admonition to his Parishioners against Popery ; Directioiis for 
the Conversation of the Clergy ; The Royal Apology. 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 207 

Joshua Barnes, 1654-1712, was Greek Professor at Cambridge, and a theological 
writer of considerable note. He wrote a History of Edward III., and published edi- 
tions of Anacreon, Homer, and Thucydides. He wrote also a Poetical Paraphi-ase of 
the Book of Esther, and numerous other works, prose and poetical. His facility in 
Greek was remarkable. " He could off-hand turn a paragraph in a newspaper, or a 
hawker's bill, into any kind of Greek meti'e, and has often been known to do so among 
his Cambridge friends." — Allibone. 

Thomas Doolittle, 1630-1707, a Non-conformist divine, published A Complete Body 
of Practical Divinity, besides other theological works. 

John Gother, 1704, originally a member of the Church of England, became a 

Catholic priest, and wrote many works, partly controversial and partly practical. His 
style is very highly commended by Dryden. His principal works are the following: 
A Papist Misrepresented and Represented, 4to ; Nubes Testium, or The Cloud of 
Witnesses, 4to ; Sincere Christian's Guide on the Choice of Religion; Lessons on the 
Feasts ; Sinner's Complaint to God. A collective edition of his Moral and Devotional 
Writings was published in 16 vols., 12mo. " The reader of Gother's works will perhaps 
think, with the present writer, that no composition in the English language approaches 
nearer to the nervous simplicity of the best writings of the Beau of St. Patrick's." — 
Charles Butler. 

Benjamix Keach, 1610-1704, a native of Buckinghamshire, was pastor of a Calvin- 
istic Baptist Church in South wark, London. He was persecuted for the bold advocacy, 
of his religious opinions. He was the author of a great mimber of controversial 
writings and tracts. The principal are Travels of True Godliness ; Travels of Ungod- 
liness ; Gospel Mysteries Opened ; A Golden Mine Opened. Keach was a person of 
great integrity of soul, but his style is spoiled by an excessive use of metaphor 
and allegory. 

Thomas Ward, 1652-1708, was born at Danby Castle, Yorkshire. Becoming a Catho- 
lic, he went to Rome, and remained there some years. In the reign of James II., he 
returned to England ; after the Revolution, he returned to Flanders, and died at St. 
Germains. His publications were The Errata of the English Bible ; Monomachia, a 
Duel between Dr. Tenison and a Catholic Soldier ; Queries to Protestants concerning 
the English Reformation ; England's Reformation, a Poem. This was in the Hudi- 
brastic metre. The following lines are a sample : 

" I sing the deeds of great King Harry, 
Of Ned his son, and daughter Mary, 
Whence England's Common Prayer-Book sprung, 
What canticles in kirk are sung." 

Ward wrote several other works. 

William Wall, D. D., 1646-1728, is noted for his various works in defence of inftint 
baptism; History of Infant Baptism, 2 vols., 8vo; Infant Baptism Asserted and Vindi- 
cated; Conference between two men who had Doubts about Infant Baptism, etc. 



208 DEYDEN AND HIS CONTEM POE AEI ES . 

IV. THE EARLY FRIENDS^^ 

George Fox. 

George Fox, 1624-1690, the founder of the Society of 
Friends, was chiefly distinguished by his apostolic zeal and 
labors as a preacher. He has also claims to consideration 
as a writer, both for the amount and character of his 
writings, and for the relation which they bear to a large 
and influential society of Christians. 

Fox was the son of a weaver, and was in his youth occupied in the 
service of a grazier ; while thus engaged, watching the sheep, he had 
opportunities for meditation, which, to a mind constituted as his was, 
produced a powerful impression. Becoming the subject of deep religious 
convictions, he believed himself specially called by the Holy Spirit to 
make known to his fellow-men the truths which had been impressed 
upon his own mind and conscience. He addressed himself accordingly 
to this work, and went about preaching to people, wherever he could 
find an audience. It is as a persuasive preacher, and as the founder of 
a religious Society which has exerted great influence upon the world, 
that Fox is chiefly known. Yet he wrote a good deal, and his writings 
are held in high esteem. 

The following are Fox's principal works : Journal of his Life and Travels ; Collec- 
tion of Christian Epistles, Letters, and Testimonies ; Gospel Truth Demonstrated in a 
Collection of Doctrinal Books, etc. Fox's Journal particularly is worthy of commen- 
dation. 

" It is one of the most extraordinary and instructive narratives in the world ; which 
no reader of competent judgment can peruse without revering the virtue of the 
writer." — Sir James Mackintosh. 

" I have read through the ponderous folio of George Fox. The kind-hearted owner 
trusted it to me for six months. I think I was about as many days in getting through 
it, and I do not think that I skijiped a word of it." — Charles Lamb. 

Barclay. 

Robert Barclay, 1648-1690, w^as an early member and 
the most renowned apologist of the Society of Friends. 

Career. — Barclay was of noble family, and received a thorough edu- 
cation. He attended the Scots College in Paris, of which his uncle 
was Principal, and while there became thoroughly adept in the French 
and Latin tongues, speaking and'writing them with facility. Subse- 



THE EARLY FRIEXDS. 209 

quently he gained a knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. From his un- 
common abilities and bis superior education, and from his powerful 
family connections, in both the Protestant and Catholic branches, 
worldly prospects of a most brilliant kind awaited him, should he ad- 
here to either of the two great religious parties into which the kingdom 
was then divided. But he early reached the conviction that the new 
doctrines proclaimed by George Fox were the true teachings of the 
Holy Scriptures, and having reached this conclusion, he at once cast 
in his lot with this despised and persecuted people, and thenceforth to 
the end of his days devoted his entire energies to the propagation and 
defence of their opinions. He had a kindred spirit in William Penn, 
with whom he was on terms of intimacy, and who was like himself a 
gentleman of birth and education. Barclay suffered much persecu- 
tion, being repeatedly imprisoned and enduring hardships of various 
kinds. Having more education than most of the early leaders of the 
Society, it fell to his lot to be their champion by the pen. As in those 
days George Fox was their chief preacher, so Barclay was their chief 
writer. 

Works. — Barclay's first publication, -nritten in 1670, when he vras at the age 
of tweuty-two, was Truth Cleared of Calumnies, in reply to a pamphlet by "Wil- 
liam Mitchell against the Quakers. A second treatise soon followed, Some Things 
of Weighty Concernment, also directed against Mitchell. Still a third treatise. W. 
Mitchell Unmasked appeared before the close of 1671. In 1675, appeared A Catechism 
and Confession of Faith, '' containing a true and faithful account of the principles 
and doctrines which are most surely believed by the churches of Christ in Great Britain 
and Ireland, who are reproachfully called by the name of Quakers." In this woi-k, the 
author undertakes to set forth affirmatively what the doctrines of his society were, 
and to show that they were the perfection of Protestantism. The next work, 1676, 
was The Anarchy of the Ranters, and was intended to show that the Friends were not 
liable to the objections urged against the Ranters. In 1679, he published A Vindica- 
tion of "The Anarchy," in consequence of the sharp criticism which it had provoked. 
His next work was A True and Faithful Account of his Disputes at the University of 
Aberdeen. Another work, published in 1677, and written Avhile he was in prison, is 
an appeal for toleration in matters of religion. Its title is Universal Love Considered 
and Established upon its Right Foundation, etc. In 16S6, appeared the Possibility 
and Necessity of the Inward and Immediate Revelation of the Spirit of God, written 
both in Latin and English. 

The Apology. — The greatest of all Barclay's works, and that for 
which these special controversies served as a preparative, was An 
Apology for the true Christian Divinity, as the same is held forth and 
preached by the People called in Scorn, Quakers. Barclay's Apology 
is an acknowledged classic in the theological literature of the Society. 
It has been translated into most of the languages of Europe. Before 
the close of his life, on the accession of James II., Barclay was in great 
favor at Court, and his last days were serene and peaceful. 
18* 



210 DRYDEX AND HIS CO XTEMPOE ARIES. 

WilliaiTi Penn. 

William Penn, 1644-1718, the Founder of Pennsylvania, 
was, next to Barclay, the ablest advocate and exponent of 
the doctrines of the Friends. His distinguished social po- 
sition, and his eminent public services, if they did not add 
to the force of his arguments, gained for them respectful 
attention, and helped to give protection and security to the 
rising sect. 

His Career. — William Penn was the oldest son of Admiral Penn. 
He was entered at Oxford at the age of fifteen, and while there became 
acquainted with .John Locke. He distinguished himself not only m 
Ms studies, but in boating and other athletic exercises. Attending the 
preachuig of the Quaker Thomas Loe, Penn and other students adopted 
the new views, and showed their convictions by abstaining from 
the religious observances of the University and by holding religious 
meetings of their own. They even went further, and tore off the sur- 
plices from those students who wore them in obedience to the command 
of the King. For these irregularities the young Non-conformist and 
his associates were dismissed from the University. The disgrace was 
a bitter mortification to the old Admiral, who attempted to reclaim 
his son by entreaties, arguments, and even by blows. 

After a partial reconciliation, Penn was sent to the continent with 
the hope that travel and gay society might dissipate these religious 
notions. He was recalled from his European tour to take charge of 
the estate while the Admiral was absent in fighting the Dutch. Penn's 
seriousness returning, he was sent to Ireland to join the gay court of 
the Duke of Ormond, and while there had some experience of military 
life, and almost determined to become a soldier. The only authentic 
portrait of him was painted, at this time, and represents him in mili- 
tary costume. At Cork, where he went on business for his father, he 
again attended the preaching of Thomas Loe, and all his early convic- 
tions were revived. 

From that time, Penn's resolution was taken, and he never swerved 
from it. The breach between him and his father increased, and he was 
finally driven an exile from his father's house. Soon after this, in 
1668, Penn began to preach and to write in defence of the new doc- 
trmes. He suffered frequent persecutions and imprisonments, but 
steadfastly maintained his doctrine and practice. A reconciliation 
took place between Penn and his father, before the death of the latter. 



THE EARLY FRIENDS. 211 

The death of the Admiral left Penn in the possession of an ample in- 
come. 

Colonization Scheme. — One item in the property which Penn inher- 
ited from his father was a claim against the Government of £16,000 
for services rendered. Believing tliat he could best realize his views 
in regard to religious and civil liberty in a new country, he sold his 
claim to the Government for the territory which afterwards became 
the Province of Pennsylvania, with the right to colonize the same. 
Penn came to his new colony in 1682, and remained until 1684, regu- 
lating its affairs. Returning to England, he took an active part in the 
political affairs of England, and was a great favorite with James II. 

W(yrTcs. — Penn's writings were numerous and exerted a powerful influence. They 
were publi.slied in a collected form in 172S, in 2 vols., folio. Those of most note are 
Truth Exalted; The Sandy Foundation Shaken; No Cross, No Crown; Quakerism a 
New Name for Old Christianity : The Great Law of Liberty of Conscience Debated and 
Defended; Truth Kecovered from Imposture, etc. 

Isaac Pentngton, 1617-1679, was connected by marriage with 
William Penn, and was a zealous advocate of the doctrines of the 
Friends. 

Penington travelled a good deal as a preacher, and was six times imprisoned. His 
publications were numerous, and were reprinted after his death in a folio volume, 
called The Works of the Long-^Iournful and Soul-Distressed Isaac Penington. The 
titles of some of these pieces are A Word for the Common Weal ; The Fundamental 
Right, Safety, and Liberty of the People Briefly Asserted; Testimony Concerning 
Church Governments and Liberty of Conscience, etc. Mr. John Penington, the late 
amiable and intelligent bookseller of Philadelphia, to whom, during his life, almost 
every literary man of that city was under personal obligations, was a descendant in 
the fifth degree from the good old Quaker, Isaac Penington. 

George Whitehead, 1636-172.3, a preacher of note among the Friends, was born at 
Sunbigg, Westmoreland. He labored with great zeal for the spread of the gospel, 
nothing daunted by persecutions and discouragements. His printed works are the Na- 
ture of Christianity in tlie True Light ; The Christian Quaker, written jointly by Penn 
and AVhitehead ; Enthusiasm above Atheism ; The Way of Life and Perfection Livingly 
Demonstrated; Clnistian Progress of George Whitehead, being Memoirs of his Life ; 
An Antidote against the Venom of the Snake in the Grass. 

Thomas Elwood, 1639-1713, was a member of the Society of Friends, and one of their 
preachers. He is connected in a pleasant manner with the history of Milton, having 
been employed for some time to read to the poet after the latter had become blind. 
Milton having submitted to Elwood the manuscript of Paradise Lost for his judgment 
thereon, Elwood replied: "Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost; but what 
hast thou to say of Paradise Found? " Whereupon, says J]lwood, Milton " made no 
answer, but sat some time in a muse." This remark is supposed to have first sug- 
gested the idea of Paradise Regained. Elwood wrote Davideis, a sacred Poem ; The 



212 DRYDEN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Foundation of Tithes Shaken ; Forgery no Christianity; Sacred Ilistorj', 2 vols., fol.- 
Autobiography, etc. 

William Sewel, 1650-1726, a member of the Society of Friends, was born in Am- 
sterdam. He was a weaver by trade, but employed his leisure hours in study and 
in writing. Besides an English and Dutch Dictionary, and some other works of that 
kind, he wrote A History of the Rise, Increase, and Progress of the Christian I'eople 
called Quakers. " Reader, if you are not acquainted with it, I would recommend to 
you, above all church narratives, to read Sewel's History of the Quakers. It is in 
folio, and is the .abstract of the Journals of Fox and the primitive Friends. Here is 
nothing to stagger you, nothing to make you mistrust, no suspicion of alloy, no drop 
or dreg of the worldly or ambitious spirit." — Charles Lamb. 

Edward Bukrough,- 16.3-1-1668, a member of the Society of Frit-nds, published seve- 
ral popular works in advocacy of his principles: Message to the Present Rulers of 
England; Wholesale Information to the King of England, etc. 





CHAPTER XL 
Pope and his Contemporaries. 

The eighteenth century opens with the reign of Queen 
Anne, the last of the Stuart sovereigns, 1702-1714, followed 
by the reign of George I., the first of the Brunswick dynasty, 
1714-1727. 

The first third of the century is made illustrious by many 
great names in literature. For convenience of treatment, 
these are considered under four heads, or sections : 1. The 
Poets, beginning with Pope ; 2. The Dramatists, beginning 
with Wycherley; 3. The Prose Writers, beginning with Ad- 
dison ; 4. Theological WriterS; beginning with Butler. 

I. THEPOETS. 

Pope. 

Alexander Pope, 1688-1744, reigned supreme in the do- 
main of letters during all the first part of the eighteenth 
century. 

His poetry had not the naturalness and simplicity of Chaucer's, the 
universality of Shakespeare's, th6 majestic and solemn earnestness of 
Milton's, or even the freedom and breadth of Dryden's, nor did it so 
appeal to the consciousness of the national heart as tliat of the school 
which sprang up near the close of the century. It was to a certain 
degree artificial. Yet its art, it must be confessed, was consummate, 
and within the scope to which it was limited, it reached a perfection 
which has never been surpassed. It was pre-emincntlv the poetry of 

213 



214 POPE AND HIS COXTEMPOEARIES. 

the wits. But it could not touch, it never touched, the national heart, 
like the poetry of Cowper or of Burns. 

Career, — Pope was born in London, but passed a large part of his 
life in retirement at Twickenham, so that he is often called the Bard 
of Twickenham. His talents evinced themselves very earlv in life, 
so that, to use his own words, he " lisped in numbers." His publica- 
tions gained for him a handsome competence, and his house was a 
meeting-place for the leading literary men of the times. He had sev- 
eral quarrels with persons who had been intimate friends, such as Lady 
Montagu, and waged throughout life a sharp warfare against second 
and third rate authors. 

In person. Pope was small and unpretending, very delicate in health, 
not remarkable for his conversational powers, but rather husbanding 
his resources for his books and letters. One of the few attractive traits 
in Pope's character was his devotion to his aged mother. He was by 
profession a Catholic. But his religion sat easily upon him, so that he 
has been set down by some as a secret Protestant, through Warburton's 
influence, and by others as a follower of Bolingbroke. 

"Works. — Pope's chief works, given in nearly the order of their com- 
position, are : Pastorals, written by him at the age of sixteen ; Essay 
on Criticism; Rape of the Lock; Messiah; Translations of the Iliad 
and the Odyssey (in which latter he was aided by Broome and Fen- 
ton) ; Essay on Man ; and The Dunciad. 

Correspondence. — Pope's Correspondence was published in part dur- 
ing his lifetime. It was alleged by Pope that the letters had been ob- 
tained by the publisher surreptitiously ; but it has since been shown 
that there was a secret understanding between the two, Pope taking 
this way to screen himself from the imputation of vanity. 

Change in the Estimate of Him. — There was a time when Pope's 
poetry was considered the model of thought and expression. Through- 
out the entire eighteenth century his lines were regarded by all except 
his personal enemies as stamped with profound genius. The modern 
school of criticism, however, has put a juster estimate upon Pope's 
merit. It has denied him any equality with the great poets, with 
Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Milton, and scarcely even allowed him the 
first place among the second-rate poets. 

Faults and Excellencies. — Pope's works are marred by convention- 
alism and would-be neatness. Sarely if ever does the poet rise to any 
flight of passion. His uniform use of the rhyming heroic couplet be- 



THE POETS. 215 

comes excessively monotonous ; every couplet and line is so nicely 
turned and so carefully balanced, that the reader longs for an occa- 
sional irregularity. Pope is undoubtedly witty and sarcastic. The 
tendency to point and polish, which disqualified him for being a true 
epic poet, has made him the most successful epigrammatist in the lan- 
guage. No one has ever equalled him in the art of turning a couplet. 

The reader will search in vain in Pope for any of those broad strokes whereby a 
truly grand poet delineates a character or suggests a profound truth, any up-welling 
of emotion, any daring flight of imagination, anj' sweet play of humor. Still, Pope 
will remain what he has ever been, an elegant writer of English. His correctness in 
the structure of phrases and the choice of words, his. avoidance of everything bizari-e, 
render him a safe model of study for those whose style is still crude. Pope's verse can 
scarcely be a stimulant, but it may prove a wholesome corrective. 

Character of I'articular Works. — Pope's Translation of Homer is accurate 
enough ; and yet it is not Homer, for the simple reason that Homer is Ihe naive poet 
pai' excellence and Pope is the perfect type of the conventional poet. There is not the 
slightest touch of sympathy between them. The Essay on Man contains an immense 
number of excellent precepts couched in excellent couplets, any one of which by itself 
would be perfect, but which taken together form a sermon rather than a poem. The 
Rape of the Loch displays more fancy and conceit than imagination. Abelard and 
Eloise find the fire of their passion dampened materially by the Popean measure. The 
Dunciad is probably Pope's best work. In it he had the opportunity of exhibiting to 
the full his peculiar powers of satire, and the success of his poison-tipped, winged 
couplets may be estimated by the commotion and wrath which they aroused. His Cor- 
respondence is interesting, but the reader's enjoyment is spoiled by the ever recurring 
impression that the letters are not real letters — the hearty expression of individual 
feeling — but compositions studied with the public in view. 

"In the interval between the end of Milton and the beginning of Pope the art of 
song had sufi-ered one of its many metamorphoses. It had changed from an inspired 
message into an elaborate chime of words. Milton, grand, harmonious, and musical 
as is his utterance at all times, was a man overflowing with high thought and lofty mean- 
ing; with so much to say to his generation that the mode of saying it might almost 
have been expected to become indifferent to him. It never did so, because of the 
inborn music of the man, that wonderful sense of melody in which he has never been 
surpassed, if, indeed, ever equalled, in the English tongue. But notwitlistauding this 
great natural gift, his subject was the thing pre-eminent with him ; and as his subject 
was of the highest importance and solemnity, so his verse rose into organ-floods of 
severest sweetness. Dryden, who succeeded him, did not possess a similar inspiration. 
He had no message to the world to speak of, and yet he had a great deal to say. 
Accordingly with him the subject began to lower and the verse to increase in import- 
ance. In Pope this phase of poetry attained its highest development. With him 
everything gave way to beauty of expression. No prophetic burden was his to deliver. 
The music of the spheres had never caught his ear. Verse was the trade in which he 
was skilled, not the mere mode of utterance by which a mind overflowing with 
thoughts of heaven or earth communicated these thoughts to its fellows. He was an 
admirable performer upon an instrnnieiit the most delicate and finest-tonod which hu- 
manity possessed. His power on it was such that the most trivial )n>.tif the most 
mean topic, became, in liis hands, an occasion of harmony. "VVe confess without hesi- 
tation that the music of Pope's verse does not enchant and enthral our particular ear. 



216 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPOEAEIES. 

but it did that of his own generation. It belonged, as does so much of the poetry of 
France, to an age more marked by culture than by nature ; building upon certain 
doctrines and tenets of literary belief ; trusting in style as in a confession of faith, and 
establishing as strict a severance between tlie orthodox and heterodox in literature, 
as ever a community of ecclesiastics has done in a religious creed. Perhaps that was 
tlie only period of English literature in which an Academy would have been possible. 
Pope made himself the poetic standard of the age. His contemporaries were meas- 
ured by it as by a rule ; and no one came up to the height of the great master. He 
gave to his generation a stream of melodious words such as might have made the 
whole country sweet, but which, unfortunately, being often employed to set forth 
nauseous or trifling subjects, gave no nobility to the mind of his period, but only a 
mathematical music — something which touched the ear rather than the heart. But 
in Pope his school came to a close. It was impossible to do anything finer, more 
subtle or more perfect in the art of combining words. If there had been given to him 
a message to deliver, probably he would not have reached to such perfection in the 
mode of delivering it; but as it was, he brouglit to its highest fulfilment and comple- 
tion the poetical style of which he was capable." — Blackwood. 

Matthew Prior, 1664-1721, was a poet of considerable 
celebrity in the reign of Queen Anne. 

Career. — Prior was adopted by his uncle, a tavern-keeper of Lon- 
don. In this position he attracted the attention of the guests by his 
familiarity with Horace, and gained the patronage of the Earl of 
Dorset, who sent him to Cambridge. Here he graduated, was intro- 
duced into public life, and rose rapidly to distinction. He went over 
to the Tory party in 1701 or 1702, and subsequently became Ambas- 
sador at Paris, When the Whigs regained power. Prior was thrown 
into prison on the charge of treason, but was released, after two years, 
without a trial. 

WorJcs. — Prior's writings are not numerous. The best known longer works are : 
The Country Mouse and the City Mouse, written by Prior and Montagu together, 
being a Satire upon Dryden's Hind and Panther ; his Carmen Seculare, a: panegyric 
on William III. ; Solomon, and Alma, written in prison. His short, fugitive pieces, 
however, are generally considered preferable. 

Character of his Works. — The more elaborate poems are heavy, and spoiled 
by the conceits of the age. But the tales and apologues are light, graceful, spark- 
ling, and in the tone ot good society. His Alma was generally supposed to be an imi- 
tation of Hudibras. 

"Johnson speaks slightingly of his lyrics; but, with dtie deference to the great 
Samuel, Prior's seem to me among the easiest, the richest, the most charmingly 
humorous of English lyrical poems. Horace is always in his mind, and his song and 
his philosophy, his good sense, his happy, easy turns and melody, his loves and his 
epicureanism, bear a great resemblance to that most delightful and accomplished 
master." — Tliacheray. 

John Gay, 1688-1732, was one of several poets whose 



THE POETS. 217 

names and fortunes are linked in history with those of Pope 
and Swift. 

Career. — Gay was of good family, but being reduced in circum- 
stances was apprenticed to a silk-dealer. Disliking the employment, 
he obtained his release, and embarked in literary life. His first pub- 
lication, Kural Sports, was dedicated to Pope, but did not meet with 
much success. Next year he obtained the appointment of domestic 
secretary to the Duchess of Monmouth. 

First Literary Success. — The Shepherd's Week, in Six Pastorals, 
was intended to ridicule Ambrose Philips, but contained so much gen- 
uine comic humor, and such pleasant pictures of country life, that it be- 
came popular on its own account, rather than for its ridicule of another. 
The Fan, and Trivia, or the Art of Walking the Streets of London, 
followed. The latter is in the mock-heroic style, giving an account 
of the dangers encountered in walking through the crowded streets of 
the metropolis. 

Dramatic Attempts. — Gay next tried his hand at comedy, and brought out The 
Wife of Bath, but it failed of success. Another play, What D'ye Call It? was more 
successful, and induced him to try still another. Three Hours after Marriage, which 
was a faihire. An edition of his Poems by subscription, however, brought him £1000, 
and he ^-^ceived a present of South Sea Stock, which was valued at £20,000, but he 
unfortun..;ely held on to it, until the bubble burst. ^ Still another drama. The Cap- 
tives, barely escaped total fa'luro. At last, on the suggestion of Swift, Gay wrote The 
Beggar's Opera, in which the "principal characters are thieves and highwaymen. It 
had unbounded sue -'ss, being played for sixty-three nights, and still holding its place 
occasionally upon t. . stage. Another opera of the same sort, called Polly, and in- 
tended as a sequel to the first, was forbidden to be played, on account of its political 
allusions. Gay, profiting by the exasperation thus produced, published Polly by sub- 
scription, and received £1200 from the sale of it. 

Tlie Fables. — Before writing the Beggars Opera, and while in straitened circum- 
stances, he wrote a volume of Fables. They were composed at the suggestion of the 
Princess of Wales, and primarily for the instruction of her young son, the Duke of 
Cumberland. They are the most pleasing of all his works, and the only ones that 
have any enduring hold upon the public mind, except his ballad of Black-Eyed Susan. 

The Beggar's Opera is decidedly objectionable, on account of the looseness of its 
morals. It is simply employing the arts of music and song to make the life of a high- 
wajnian appear agreeable and attractive, and its representation has alwaj's been fol- 
lowed by an increase of crime. Gay has been called, indeed, the " Orpheus of High- 
waymen." 

Ambrose Philips, 1675-1749, was a poet and dramatic 
writer of considerable note. 

Philips was the author of some pastorals, a tragedy called The Dis- 
tressed Mother, drawn largely from Eacine, a translation of Sappho's 
19 



218 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Hymn to Venus, and a series of "poems of short lines," or character- 
pictures of the leading personages of the day . 

Like others of his times, Philips became involved in a literary quar- 
rel with Pope. In this, as might be expected, Philips fared badly. 
Pope ridiculed him severely, and applied to him the novel epithet of 
" Namby Pamby," which has since been adopted into the language of 
vituperation. 

" Of the Distressed Mother not much is pretended to be his own, and therefore it is no 
subject of criticism ; his other two tragedies, I believe, are not below mediocrity, nor 
above it. The pieces that please best are those v,hich, from Pope and Pope's adhe- 
rents, procured him the name of Namhy Pamhy, the poems of short lines, by which 
he paid his court to all ages and characters, from Walpole ' the steerer of the realm,' 
to Miss Pulteney in the nursery. The numbers are smooth and sprightly ; and the 
diction is seldom faulty. He has added nothing to English poetry, yet at least half 
his book deserves to be read." — Br. Johnson. 

Thomas Parnell, 1679-1718, is another of the minor British 
poets of the early part of the eighteenth century. 

Parnell was a friend of Swift, Bolingbroke, and Pope ; he was a 
native of Ireland, and he held a living in the Irish Church. His poems 
are not numerous, nor do they all rank very high. A few, however, 
such as The Hermit, Death, and the Hymn to Contentment, were 
much admired by Johnson and Goldsmith for their pure imagery and 
graceful versification, and they maintain a permanent position among 
the choice pieces of English literature. 

Nicholas Rowe, 1674-1718, has a respectable rank as a 
poet, but owes his chief celebrity to his connection with 
Shakespearian criticism. 

Career. — Eowe studied law for awhile, but, on the death of his 
father, gave himself up wholly to letters. He occupied several subor- 
dinate situations under the Government, and was made poet laureate 
in 1714. 

Kowe's literary activity was threefold : as an editor, a translator, and 
a poet. 

As an editor RoAve is known by his edition of Shakespeare, with an account of the 
dramatist's life. This edition, although not possessing great intrinsic merit, is note- 
worthy as the beginning of that long series of critical editions of Shakespeare which 
reaches down to our own day. As such, Rowe's work plays a conspicuous part in the 
history of Sliakespeare criticism. 

Rowe translated several woi'ks from the Latin and the Greek. The only one of 
them that has attained distinction is his Pbarsalia, from the Latin of Lucan. This 



THE POETS. 219 

received the hearty praise of Dr. Johnson, for its spirit and its fidelity to the original, 
although the modern school of criticism would scarcely agree fully with the Doctor, 

In addition to these labors, Rowe is the author of a number of plays, chiefly trage- 
dies. The more successful were : The Ambitious Stepmother; Tamerlane; The Fair 
Penitent ; Jane Shore ; and Lady Jane Grey. The best known is undoubtedly Jane 
Shore, which was very popular in its day and was retained on the stage until the 
early part of this century. Mrs. Siddons acted in it with great success. Rowe's style, 
an attempted imitation of Shakespeare's, was rather florid and declamatory than 
genial, and the dramatist's insight into character was anything but profound. 

James Thomson, 1700-1748, is the best of the descriptive 
poets of this period. His Seasons, and Castle of Indolence, 
have taken a permanent place in literature. 

His Career. — Thomson studied divinity at the University of Dub- 
lin, but abandoned theology for letters. Thomson's life was an un- 
eventful one, diversified only by a tour on the continent, as companion 
to Charles Talbot. Through the influence of friends, chiefly Lord Ly t- 
tleton, he obtamed the sinecure of Surveyor-General of the Leeward 
Isles. 

WorJis. — Thomson is one of the chief pastoral poets of England. His dramatic 
works — Sophonisbe, Agamemnon, and Edward and Eleanor — and his didactic poem 
on Liberty were never successful. His Seasons appeared first as detached poems, but 
were collected and published by subscription in 1730. In 1748, the year of his death, 
appeared the Castle of Indolence. This last is an allegory suggested by Spenser and 
Tasso. 

SanTc as a Poet. — Thomson is one of those minor poets who are read by each 
successive generation with about equal favor. His fame is as high now as it was dur- 
ing his lifetime, perhaps higher. His descriptions of English scenery, because of their 
faithfulness to nature, are much read by foreigners, especially by Germans. 

"Thomson is the best of our descriptive poets ; for he gives most of the poetry of 
natural description. Others have been quite equal to him, or have surpassed him, as 
Cowper for instance, in the picturesque part of his art, in marking the peculiar fea- 
tures and curious details of objects; — no one has yet come up to him in giving the 
sum total of their effects, their varying influences on the mind." — Hazlitt. 

" Thomson's genius does not so often delight us by exquisite minute touches in the 
desci-iption of nature as that of Cowper. It loves to paint on a great scale, and to 
dash objects off sweepiiigly by bold strokes. Cowper sets nature before your ej^es, — 
Thomson, before your imagination." — Professor Wilson. 

Sir Richard Blackmore, 1650-1729, was a writer of con- 
siderable note in the early part of the last century. He 
was warmly applauded by Addison and Johnson, but ridi- 
culed as a dunce by Pope and other distinguished wits of 
his day. 



220 POPE AifD HIS CONTEMPOEAEIES. 

Blackmore's first work was Prince Arthur, an Heroic Poem, which 
was immediately popular. His principal and best work was Creation, 
a Philosophical Poem. Besides these he published Paraphrases on 
various parts of the Old Testament; Essays upon several subjects; and 
numerous medical works. 

Thomas Tickell, 1686-1740, was one of the mmor poets of this 
period. 

Tickell was educated at Oxford, and gained Addison's favor by his 
verses in praise of the latter' s Eosamond. He became Addison's 
Under-Secretary, and was afterwards appointed Secretary to the Lords 
Justices of Ireland. 

Tlie Uiad. — TickelFs translation of the first book of the Iliad was supposed for 
some time to be the -v\ork of Addison, written to injure Pope's translation. It is now 
general!}' believed, however, that Addison onlj' corrected Tickell's lines. Public 
opinion has finally settled in favor of Pope, although Tickell's version is in parts 
superior. 

Other Worlis. — His other well-known poems are Kensington Garden and the 
ballad of Colin and Lucy, and esijecially the Elegy on Addison. Although some critics 
have passed unfavorable opinions upon this poem, it has been extolled by many others, 
among them Macaulay, who asserts that it unites "the energy and magnificence 
of Dryden to the tenderness and purity of Cowper." Dr. Johnson even declares that 
there is not "a more sublime or more elegant funeral poem in the whole compass of 
English literature." 

Richard Savage, 1696-1743, the reputed illegitimate son of the 
Countess of Macclesfield, was quite as famous for his life of adventures 
as for his poetical abilities. 

Savage's life was written by Dr. Johnson and incorporated in the Lives of the Eng- 
lish Poets. This same sketch was afterwards prefixed to Evans's collective edition of 
Savage's Avorks. Cunningham, in his edition of Johnson's Lives, has amplified and 
corrected the story by his notes. 

Woi'ks, — The most conspicuous of Savage's works are The Tragedy of Sir Thomas 
Overbury, The Bastard (a pasquil against his reputed mother), and The Wanderer. 
Many of his works were dedicated to prominent persons among the gentry and no- 
bility. Savage forfeited his life by killing a man in a drunken quarrel, but was par- 
doned. He died while in prison for debt. 

" Such were the life and death of Richard Savage, a man equally distinguished by 
his virtues and vices, and at once remarkable for his weaknesses and abilities. . . . 
On a bulk, in a cellar or in a glass-house, among thieves and beggars, was to be found 
the author of The Wanderer, the man of exalted sentiments, extensive views, and 
curious observations; the man whose remarks on life might haA'e assisted the states- 
man, whose ideas of virtue might have enlightened the moralist, whose eloquence 
might have influenced senates, and whose delicacy might have polished courts." — 
Dr. Johnson. 



THE POETS. 221 

Rev. Egbert Blair, 1699-1747, was a Scotch poet and clergyman, 
distantly related to Dr. Hugh Blair, and the author of a poem of some 
note, called The Grave. 

"The Grave is a complete and powerful poem, of limltefl design, but masterly exe- 
cution. The subject precluded much orii^iuality of conception, but, at the same time, 
is recommended by its awful importance and its universal application." — Chambers. 
"Tlie Grave is remarkable for its masculine vigor of thought and expression, and 
for the imaginative solemnity with which it invests the most familiar truths ; and it 
has always been one of our most popular religious poems." — Craik. Blair's Grave 
was once much read, but later and better works have pretty much crowded it aside. 
It is now rarely found except on the upper shelves consecrated to forgotten worthies. 

John Hughes, 1677-1720, was the author of a number of poems and miscellaneous 
pieces, and translator of some French works. The Siege of Damascus is the only one 
of Hughes's original works now known to the general public. He contributed several 
pieces to The Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian. 

"Of this drama (Siege of Damascus), which is still acted, the sentiments and mo- 
rality are pure and correct, the imagery frequently beautiful, and the diction and versi- 
fication for the most part clear and melodious. It is defective, notwithstanding, in 
the most essential quality of dramatic composition, the power of affecting the pas- 
sions. . . . Hughes has more merit as a translator of poetry than as an original poet. 
. . . On the prose of Hughes I am inclined to bestow more praise than on his poetry. 
. . . All the periodical essays of Hughes are written in a style which is, in general, 
easy, correct, and elegant," etc. — Drakes Essays. 

George GRA^■TI1LE, Viscount Lansdowne, 1667-1735, was educated at Cambridge, and 
displayed such precocity of merit that he received the degree of A. M. at the age of 
tliirteen. He wrote a number of poems, dramas, and other pieces, of no great merit. 
He was an imitator of Waller, and was, according to Horace 'VVali^'ole, "a faint copy 
of a faint master." His name figures a good deal in the literature of the day to which 
he belonged. 

William Walsh, 1663-1707, was one of the minor poets of the reign of Queen Anne. 
He was educated at Oxford; was a member of Parliament; and Gentleman of the 
Horse to the Queen. He wrote A Dialogue Concerning Women, being a defence 
of the sex ; Letters and Poems, Amorous and Gallant. All his poetical pieces were in- 
cluded in The Works of the Minor Poets, published in 1749. "He has more elegance 
than vigor, and seldom rises higher than to be pretty." — Johnson. Walsh befriended 
both Di-yden and Pope, when they were just rising into notice, and had his reward in 
the good words which they gave him when their own star was in the ascendant. 
"William Walsh, of Abberley, Esq., who has so long honored me with his friendship, 
and who, without flattery, is the best critic of our nation." — Dryden. 

" Such late was Walsh, the muse's judge and friend, 
Who justly knew to blame, or to commend." — J^ope. 
Put for his connection with these great names, Walsh would long since have passed 
into oblivion. 

Elijah Fenton, 1683-1730, was one of those employed by Pope to assist him in 

translating the Odyssey. Fen ton translated Books 1, 4, 19, and 20, in what is known 

as Pope's Homer. He wrote also Marianne, a Tragedy ; Poems on Several Occasions ; 

and Noi.es on Wallej-'s Poems. He was a classical teacher, and a man of considerable 

19* 



222 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

literary ability. He undertook to revise the punctuation of Milton's poems, on the 
ground that Milton being blind, and writing by dictation, did not see, and was not re- 
sponsible for, the punctuation. 

Sir Samuel Garth, 1719, was an eminent practising physician. On the occa^ 

sion of a quarrel between two physicians and two apothecaries, about the plan for fur- 
nishing the poor with medical advice gratis, and with medicines at cost, a project 
which originated with the physicians and was opposed by the apothecaries, Garth, 
who had some poetical ability, published a satirical poem, The Dispensary, in which 
the apothecaries were held up to ridicule. The poem passed through numerous edi- 
tions, and in each edition received finishing touches from the author. The poem was 
famous in its day, but it has not lieen able to hold its place in the permanent literh-ture 
of the nation. " The wit of this slight performance may have somewhat evaporated 
with age, but it cannot at any time have been very pungent.". — Crailc. 

Gilbert West, LL.D., 1705-1756, a nephew of Sir Richard Temple, and a relative of 
William Pitt and of Lord George Lyttleton, attracted considerable attention among 
his contemporaries by his writings. He wrote A Canto of the Fairy Queen, in imita- 
tion of Spenser ; The Order of the Garter, a drama ; The Odes of Pindar, translated in 
verse ; The History and Evidences of the Resurrection of Christ, prose. 

William Broome, 1745, was a poet of ability, employed by Pope to translate 

certain portions of Homer. Pope assigned eight books of the Odj'ssey to be trans- 
lated by Broome, and four to be done by Fenton, and translated the remaining 
twelve himself. The whole passes as " Pope's Homer." Broome was dissatisfied with 
the amount of money allowed him for his share of the work, and charged Pope with 
avarice. Pope repaid the charge by putting Broome in the Dunciad. 

" Pope came off clean with Homer ; but they say 
Broome went before, and kindly swept the way." — Henley. 

"Of Broome, though it cannot be said that he was a great poet, it would be unjust 
to deny that he was an excellent versifier ; his lines are smooth and sonorous, and his 
diction is select and elegant." — Johnson, 

Isaac Hawkins Browne, 1705-1760, was a poet of some celebrity. The work of his 
which is supposed to display most genius is a poem in Latin, On the Immortality of the 
Soul. His most successful hit was The Pipe of Tobacco, in which he imitates with great 
effect the peculiarities of Pope, Swift, Young, Thomson, Cibbei-, and Ambrose Philips. 
He wrote also a poem on Design and Beauty. He was elected to Parliament, but took 
no part in its debates. "We must not estimate a man's power by his not being able 
to deliver his sentiments in public. Isaac Hawkins Browne, one of the first writers 
of this country, got into Parliament, and never opened his mouth." — Dr. Johnson. 

Thomas Cooke, 1702-1756, was one of the poets ridiculed by Pope in the Dunciad. 
Standing on that pillory, however, is no evidence of ill-desert, as Pope wrote for re- 
venge rather than in the exercise of a judicial spirit. Cooke was undoubtedly a poet 
and a man of learning, and his chief offeTice was that he published a translation of 
certain passages in the Iliad, showing the errors in Pope's translation. The follow- 
ing are some of Cooke's publications : The Knights of the Batli ; The Triumph of Love 
and Honor; The Eunuch, a Farce; The Mournful Nuptials; Translations from Hesiod, 
Plautus and Cicero ; Life and Writings of Andrew Marvell. 



f 

THE DRAMATISTS. 223 

II. THE DRAMATISTS. 

A school of dramatists prevailed in the period now under considera- 
tion, who were equally distinguished by their abilities and their licen- 
tiousness. The writers of this class belong partly to the previous cen- 
tury, as they began their career during the life of Dryden, and took 
their character from the general corruption of manners which prevailed 
after the restoration of the Stuart dynasty. The four most conspicuous 
of these writers were Congreve, Wycherley, Vanbrugh, and Farquhar, 
of whom Wycherley was the earliest, and Congreve was, by general 
consent, the greatest. With these writers is indissolubly connected the 
name of Jeremy Collier, the man who, almost single-handed, under- 
took to stem this general torrent of licentiousness, and who so effectu- 
ally exposed the enormous immoralities of the stage as to arouse the 
nation to a sense of shame, and to bring back dramatic literature once 
more within the decencies and proprieties of life. 

Wyelierley. 

William Wycherley, 1640-1715, was a prominent dram- 
atist of the age of the Eestoration, and the founder of the 
school of licentious and immoral plays which then prevailed. 

Career. — Much of Wycherley's early life was passed on the conti- 
nent, where, by the influence of Madame Eambouillet, he was induced 
to embrace the Catholic religion. Having returned to England, he 
entered Oxford and rejoined the Anglican communion, but under 
James II. turned back again to the Catholic Church. 

Wycherley's career was a chequered one. At the age of forty, hav- 
ing already produced his most celebrated plays, he married a wealthy 
countess, whose jealousy kept him away from Court, and lost him the 
royal favor. After his wife's death, her fortune was consumed in a 
heavy lawsuit, and the property which he inherited from his father 
was mortgaged and entailed. He was kept in prison for debt seven 
years. In his seventy-sixth year, eleven days before his death, he mar- 
ried a young girl, merely to defeat the inheritance of his nephew, whom 
he disliked. 

Character. — Wycherley as a man and as a writer is a fit represent- 
ative of the age in which he lived. Handsome, shiftless, prodigal, 
dissolute, he was the object of envy, and yet dragged out an uncom- 
fortable, if not an unhappy existence. There seems to have been no 
real substance in his character, although we cannot call him a bad man 
at heart. 



224 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORAKIES. 

WorJis. — Tha bfst known of his dramas are Love in a Wood, The Gentleman 
Dancing-Master, The Country Wife, and Tiie Plain Dealer. He also published a vol- 
ume of Miscellaneous Poems, which Macaulay disposes of by the trenchant phrase, 
"this bulky volume of obscene doggerel." Kis comedies also partake of the immo- 
rality of tiie age, but to a less extent than some others, and are relieved by touches 
of wit and broad humor. 

It is generally assumed by critics that Congreve is much superior to Wycherley as a 
dramatist. Hazlitt, however, holds that the latter has a broader humor, more natural 
characters, and more striking incidents; that in Congreve the workmanship overlies 
the material, and that we forget Congreve's characters and remember only what they 
say; whereas in Wycherley we remember better the characters themselves and the 
action. A collection of Wycherley's posthumous works, in prose and verse, was pub- 
lished by Theobald. Wycherley was very intimate with Charles II , and with the Duke 
of iluckingham and other profligate wits of the day. The anecdotes told of him are 
curious as illustrative of the manners of the times. 

" Wycherley was a very handsome man. His acquaintance with the famous Duchess 
of Cleveland commenced oddly enough. One day, as ho passed that Duchess's coach 
in the ring, she leaned out of the window and cried out, loud enough to be heard dis- 
tinctly by him, ' Sir, you 're a rascal ! you 're a villain ! ' Wycherley from that instant 
entertained hopes. He did not fail waiting on her the next morning, and, with a very 
melancholy tone, begged to know how it was possible for him to have so much diso- 
bliged her Grace. They were very good friends from that time." — Spence's Anecdotes. 

" Wycherley was in a bookseller's shop at Bath, or Tunbridge, when Lady Drogheda 
came in and happened to inquire for the Plain Dealer. A friend of Wycherley's, who 
stood by him, pushed him toward her, and said, ' There 's the Plain Dealer, madam, if 
you want him.' Wycherley made his excuses, and Lady Drogheda said that 'she 
loved plain dealing best.' He afterwards visited that lady, and some time after mar- 
ried her. This proved a great blow to his fortunes; just before the time of his court- 
ship he was designed for governor to the late Duke of Richmond, and was to have 
been allowed fifteen hundred pounds a year from the Government. His absence from 
Court in the progress of this amour, and his being yet more absent after his marriage 
(for Lady Drogheda was vei'y jealous of him), disgusted his friends there so much that 
he lost all his interest with them. His lady died, and his misfortunes were such that 
he was thrown into the Fleet, and lay there seven years. It was then that Colonel 
Butt got his Plain Dealer to be acted, and contrived to get the King (James the Sec- 
ond) to be there. The colonel attended him thither. The King was mightily pleased 
with the play,— asked who was the author of it; and, upon hearing that it was one of 
Wycherley's, complained that he had not seen him for so many years, and inquired 
Avhat was become of him. The colonel improved this opportunity so well that the 
King gave orders that his debts should be discharged out of the privy purse."— »S)9ewce's 
Anecdotes. 

" His fame as a writer rests wholly on his comedies, and chiefly on the last two. 
Even a,s a comic writer, he was neither of the best school, nor highest in his school. 
He was, in truth, a worse Congi-eve. His chief merit, like Congreve's, lies in the style 
of his dialogue. But the wit which lights up The Plain Dealer and The Country Wife 
is pale and flickering when compared with the gorgeous blaze which dazzles us almost 
to blindness in Love for Love and the Way of the World. — In truth, his mind, imless 
we are greatly mistaken, was naturally a very meagre soil, and was forced only by 
great labor and outlay to bear fruit, which, after all, was not of the highest flavor. 
He had scarcely more claim to originality than Terence. It is not too much to say 
that there is hardly anything of the least value in his plays of which the hint is not 



THE DRAMATISTS. 225 

to be found elsewhere. The only thing original about Wycherley, the only tiling 
which he could furnish from his own mind in inexhaustible abundance, was profli- 
gacy. It is curious to observe how everything that he touched, however pure and 
noble, took in an instant the color of his mind. We pass a very severe censure on Wy- 
cherley when we say that it is a relief to turn from him to Congreve." — Lord Macaulay, 
Comic Dramatists of the Bestoratioji. 

Congreve. 

William Congreve, 1666-1729, a native of Ireland, ex- 
celled all the men of his generation as a writer of the licen- 
tious and immoral plays then in fashion. He was one of 
those whose indecencies were exposed so unceremoniously 
by the doughty Jeremy Collier. 

At the bringing out of his first play, The Old Bachelor, which could 
not now be read aloud in any family circle, Congreve had the support 
of all the great theatrical celebrities, Mr. Betterton, Mr. Powel, Mrs. 
Bracegirdle, Mrs. Barry ; his play was commended by Dryden, as being 
the best he had ever heard ; he received official recognition from the 
Government, in the bestowal by Lord Halifax of a lucrative office in 
the Customs ; the public were in ecstasies. 

Congreve's plays are published in 3 vols., 8vo. The names of some of those best 
known are The Double Dealer; The Mourning Bride; The Way of the Woi'Id; The 
Judgment of Paris. Ue wi-ote some other things, but excelled only in the drama. 
" The powers of Congreve seem to desert him when he leaves the stage, as Antaeus 
was no longer strong than when he could touch the ground." — Johnson. 

"We have seen in Swift a humorous philosopher, whose truth frightens one, and 
whose laughter makes one melancholy. We have in Congreve a humorous observer 
of another school, to whom the world seems to have no moral at all, and whose ghastly 
doctrine seems to be that we should eat, drink, and be merry when we can-, and go to 
the deuce (if there be a deuce) when the time comes." — Thackeray. 



Vanbrugh. 

Sir John Vanbrugh, 1666-1726, another of those cor- 
rupt dramatists, was about equally distinguished as a writer 
and an architect. 

Career. — Vanbrugh was the descendant of a Flemish Protestant 
family, settled in England. Early in life he entered the French army, 
but did not remain in it a great while. Returning to England he gained 
distinction both as an architect and a writer of comedies. In the for- 
mer capacity he erected Castle Howard for the Earl of Carlisle, and 
Blenheim for the Duke of Marlborough, besides many other miui- 

P 



226 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

sions for the nobility. In 1714 he was knighted and made Comptroller 
of Public Works. 

Writings. — In 1697, Vaabrugh published the first of his comedies, The Relapse, 
•niiich was very successful. This was followed by The I'rovoked Wile, which met with 
even greater success. The Confederacy, The Couutry House, The Journey to London, 
together with some adaptations of Moliere"s pieces to the English stage, comprise his 
other plays. lie left one, The Provoked Husband, uufinished. 

Character as a Writer. — Yanbrugh possessed all the merits and demerits of 
his age. His plays abound in wit and strokes of comic delineation, but are all disfig- 
ured by their tone of profligacy. Like Wycherley and Congreve, Vaabrugh failed to 
rise superior to the manners of the reign of Queen Anne, although he is perhaps not 
so wholly abandoned to them as were many of his contemporaries. 

" The Relapse and The Provoked Wife of Yanbrugh have attained a considerable 
reputation. In the former, the character of Amanda is interesting; especially in the 
momentary wavering and quick recovery of her virtue. This is the first homage that 
the theatre had paid, since the Restoration, to female chastity; and, notwithstanding 
the vicious tone of the other classes, in which Yanbrugh has gone as great lengths as 
any of his contemporaries, we perceive the beginnings of a reaction in public spirit 
which gradually reformed and elevated the moral standard of the stage. The Pro- 
voked Wife, though it cannot be said to give any proofs of this sort of improvement, 
has some merit as a comedy : it is witty and animated, as Yanbrugh usually was ; the 
character of Sir John Brute may not have been too great a caricature of real manners 
such as survived from the debased reign of Charles, and the endeavor to expose the 
grossness of the elder generation was itself an evidence that abetter polish had been 
given to social life." — Hallam. 

Farquhar. 

George Farquhar, 1678-1707, was anotlier dramatic writer 
of note. 

Farquhar was an Irishman by birth, and entered Trinity College, 
Dublin, but abandoned study and turned player. After playing for 
some time, he began writing for the stage, and with marked success. 
His plays are all in the comic Yein, either Comedies or Farces, and 
like the other dramas of those days are licentious and immoral. 

Works. — The following are the principal: Love and a Bottle, a Comedy; Constant 
Couple, a Trip to the Jubilee, a Comedy; Sir Harry Wildair, a Comedy; The Incon- 
stant, or the Way to Win Him, a Comedy; The Stage-Coach, a Farce ; The Twin Ri- 
vals, a Comedy; The Recruiting OfBcer, a Comedy ; The Beaux Stratagem, a Comedy ; 
Poems, Letters, and Essays. 

CoLLEY CiBBER, 1671-1757, Poet Laureate to George II., began his 
career as an actor, but afterwards wrote plays of his own, and acquired 
great applause both for his authorship and his acting. 

Cibber received from George I. a pension of £200, and was made Laureate by George 
II., in 1730, after which he did not appear on the stage except on rare occasions. A 



THE DRAMATISTS. 227 

list of thirty of his Plays is given. Ilis best piece is The Careless Husband. lie 
wrote An Apology for his Life, containing some curious information in regard to the 
social life of those days. Pope had a spite against Gibber, and gave him a conspicuous 
place in the Dunciad. The injustice of the thing only recoiled on Pope himself, as 
Cibber was anything but a dullard, and among his contemporaries had a high reputa- 
tion for his liveliness and wit. 

Theophilcs Cibber, 1703-1758, was son of CoUey Cibber, and like him an actor and 
a dramatist. His pieces are not numerous. He was the reputed author of a work 
called "Gibber's Lives of the Poets." But Johnson says that the work was written 
by another, and that Gibber had nothing to do with it except to put his name to it, 
for which service the publisher gave him ten guineas. 

Mrs. Charlotte Charke, 1760, was daughter of Colley Cibber. After separat- 
ing from her husband, she went upon the stage. Quarrelling with the Manager, she 
lampooned him in a dramatic piece, called The Art of Management, or Tragedy Ex- 
pelled. Other pieces: The Lover's Treat; The History of Henry Dumont; A Narra- 
tive of her own Life. 

Thomas D'Urfet, 1723, generally known as Tom D'Urfey, was of French Pro- 
testant descent, and was destined for the law. But a love of gay company and of light 
literature soon carried him into other paths. He had the dangerous accomplishments 
of being able both to write and to sing a good song, and consequently was much in 
demand in scenes of revelry. He wrote many dramatic pieces, which were played, 
and he had the general reputation of being a good fellow. But his talents brought 
him little money, and in his old age he was in extremely narrow circumstances. By 
the influence of Addison, one of D'Urfey's Plays was acted for his benefit, and with 
considerable pecuniary returns. A collection of his Songs, Satires, etc., was also pub- 
lished with the same benevolent end, under the title of Laugh and Be Pat, or Pills to 
Purge Melancholy. 

Thomas Southerne, 1660-1746, a native of Ireland, and educated at Trinity College, 
Dublin, was a lawyer, a soldier, and a dramatist. It is only in the latter capacity that 
he gained distinction. His plays were pecuniarily successful. The two most known 
to readers are The Discovery, and Oroonoko. 

" Southeme's Discovery, latterly represented under the name of Isabella, is almost as 
familiar to the lovers of our theatre as Venice Presei'ved itself : and ft)r the same reason, 
that Avhenever an actress of great tragic powers arises, the part of Isabella is as fitted 
to exhibit them as that of Belvidera. The choice and conduct of the story, however, 
are Southerne's chief merits ; for there is little vigor in the language, though it is 
natural, and free from the usual faults of his age. A similar character may be given 
to his other tragedy, Oroonoko, in -which Southerne deserves the praise of having first 
of any English writer denounced the traffic in slaves and the cruelties of the West 
India bondage. The moral feeling is high in this tragedy, and it has sometimes been 
acted with a certain success ; but the execution is not that of a superior dramatist." 
Hallam. 

John Dennis, 1657-1734, was noted in his day as a critic, and as a dramatic and po- 
litical writer. He was a native of London, and was educated at Cambridge. His 
principal works are: Plot and No Plot; Kiualdo and Armitla; Orpheus and Kmidia, 
a Masque; The Comical Gallant, etc. He criticised Addison's Cato and Pope's Essay 
on Criticism with great severity, and was rewarded for the latter by being put inta 



228 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORAPIES. 

the Dunciad. " Dennis attained the ambiguous honor of being distinguished as ' the 
cr tic,' and he may yet instruct us how the moral influences the literary character, 
an i how a certain talent that can never mature itself into genius, like the pale fruit 
tli.it liangs in the shade, ripens only into sourness.'' — D' Israeli. 

Mrs. Susaxxah Cemlivre, 1667-1722, was thrice married; the last time to Joseph 
Centlivre, chief cook to Queen Anne. Mrs. Centlivre was a woman of note in the 
theatrical world, partly as an actress, but chiefly as a writer of plays. She was in 
great favor with Steele, Kowe, Budgell, and others of that set. Her works have been 
published in 3 vols. She wrote nineteen Plays; among them, A Bold Stroke for a 
"Wife, and The Perjured Husband, are considered worthy of special mention. She was 
celebrated for her wit and beauty, as well as for her literary accomplishments. "If 
we do not allow her to be the very first of our female writers for the stage, she has 
but one above her, and may justly be placed next to her predecessor in di-amatic glory, 
the great Mrs. Behn." — Biog. Dram. 

Mrs. Catherixe Cockburn, 1679-1749, had considerable success as a dramatic writer. 
A Tragedy of hers, written when she was only seventeen years old, was played with 
great success in the Theatre Royal. The names of some of her plays are: Agnes de 
Castro, a Tragedy; Fatal Friendship, a Tragedy; The Unhappy Penitent; The P.evo- 
lution of Sweden. She wrote A Letter in Vindication of Locke's Essay ; and Remaika 
upon Rutherford's Essay on the Nature and Obligations of Virtue. 

Robert Dodslet, 1703-1764, is noted both as an author and a publisher. He began 
life as apprentice to a tradesman, and afterwards he was a footman. Ilis first publi- 
cation, made when he was twenty-nine years old, was a collection of poems, called 
The Muse in Livery, or The Footman's Miscellany. His next essay was a drama, The 
Toy Shop. The manuscript being sent to Pope for examination, he pronounced a 
warm verdict of approval, which led to its being played at Covent Garden Theatre. 
Dodsley then opened a bookstore, and was successful in the business. He combined 
it, however, with authorship and with the patronage of authors. He wrote several 
other plays, The King and the Miller of Mansfield; The Blind Beggar of Bethnal 
Green ; Cleone, a Tragedy, besides numerous poems. He published a Collection of Old 
Plays, 12 vols., and wrote The Economy of Human Life, etc. But the greatest service 
he did to literature was his establishment of the Annual Register, begun in 175S at 
the suggestion of Edmund Burke (who had the charge of it for some time) and con- 
tinued to the present time. Dodsley was the first to give employment to Johnson, 
and his relations generally with the men of letters in liis day were of the most 
pleasant kind. 

Jeremy Collier. 

jEEEirY CoLLTER, 1650-1726, an English Nonjuring Bishop, and a 
man of great celebrity, had in a high degree what the EngUsh call 
pluck, and neither fear nor favor could make him swerve a hair from 
what he deemed to be right and true. Collier was not a dramatist, but 
he is considered in this connection, because his greatest celebrity grew 
out of the battle which he had with the play -writers. 

Tlie work to which reference has been made was A Short View of the Profaneness 
and Immorality of the Stage. At no time in the history of the world has there been a 



THE PROSE WRITERS. 229 

stage so corrupt and licentious as that of England after the downfall of the Puritans 
and the return of the Stuarts to power. Collier attacked the monstrous evil. His 
essay " threw the whole literary world into commotion. There is hardly any book of 
that time from which it would be possible to select specimens of writing so excel- 
lent and so various. lie was complete master of the rhetoric of honest indignation. 
The spirit of the book is truly heroic." — Macaulay. Some of the dramatists, Yan- 
brugh and others, attempted a reply, but their defence was lame. The victory was 
overvvhelming. After fighting and floundering for some years, these indecent Avriters 
were either silenced, or were obliged to reform the character of their plays ; and the 
English drama ever since has been of a more elevated stamp, in consequence of the 
terrible castigation which it then received. 

Collier was almost always engaged in controversy. For the free expression of his 
opinion, he was imprisoned and outlawed, but he none the less spoke and wrote what 
he thought. Besides his controversial works, which need not here be recounted, he 
wrote Essays ujjon several moral subjects (Pride, Clothes, Duelling, General Kindness, 
etc., etc.,) which are highly spoken of. He wrote also an Ecclesiastical History of Great 
Britain, 2 vols., foL, and translated Moreri's Great Historical Dictionary, 2 vols., fol. 

III. THE PROSE WRITERS. 

Addison. 

Joseph Addison, 1672-1719, one of the greatest ornaments 
of English literature, excelled, as did some others to be men- 
tioned in this section, both in prose and verse. His great- 
est distinction, however, was as a writer of prose. He is 
generally accepted as the prince of English Essayists, and 
his Essays in The Spectator are held to be the finest models 
in the language, of that style of writing. 

Education. — Addison liad every advantage of education which the 
University of Oxford and the best preparatory schools in England 
could furnish, and he very early gave evidence of that elegant scholar- 
ship and refined taste which marked all his productions. He entered 
the University at the age of fifteen, and greatly distinguLshed himself 
there by his diligence and scholarship. He began his career as an 
author at the age of twenty-two, and he continued to write and pub- 
lish, both m prose and verse, to the time of his death. 

Career. — A poem addressed to King William on one of his cam- 
paigns, and written at the age of twenty-three, secured to the young- 
author an annual pension of £300. At the age of twenty-eight he 
visited Italy, where lie remained for two or three years. On the death 
of tlie King, and the discontinuance of the pension, Addison was 
obliged to look about him for some other means of subsistence. Not 
long after, however, he was applied to bv the leaders of the Govern- 
20 



230 POPE A^^D HIS COXTEMPOEARIES. 

ment under tlie new sovereign to write a poem commemorative of the 
celebrated battle of Blenheim. The task was undertaken by Addison, 
and the poem, called The Campaign, gave great satisfaction, and led 
to a long series of political preferments. He was married at the age 
of fortv-four to the dowager Countess of Warwick. Johnson says : 
"This marriage, if uncontradicted report can be credited, made no 
addition to his happiness; it neither found nor made them equal. 
She always remembered her own rank, and thought herself entitled to 
treat with very little ceremony the tutor of her son." Addison died 
full of honors, and in great serenity of mind, when just entering his 
forty-eighth year. 

Woi^JiS. — Addison's writings, both prose and poetical, are Tery numerous. Only 
a few of tliem can here be named. The poems best known are The Campaign, already 
mentioned, and the tragedy of Cato. Ilis principal prose writings are essays con- 
tributed to The Tatler and The Spectator. It is as an Essayist that his peculiar excel- 
lencies a[)pear to the greatest advantage. Ilis contributions to the papers just named, 
particularly those to The Spectator, of which paper, he was the originator, are gener- 
ally conceded to be the best specimens of essay writing to be found in the language, 
and they are held up by the most eminent critics, as models of style. It was in refer- 
ence to these essays, especially, that Johnson uttered his oft-quoted saying: ''Who- 
ever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not 
ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the study of Addison." Says Macau- 
lay : " It is praise enough to say of a writer, that, in a high department of literature, 
in which many eminent writers have distinguished themselves, he has no equal ; and 
this may, with strict justice, be said of Addison. He is entitled to be considered, not 
only as the greatest of English Essayists, but as the forerunner of the great English 
Novelists. Ilis best essays approach near to absolute perfection; nor is their excel- 
lence more wonderful than their variety." 

Among the smaller poems of Addison are four of the nature of hymns, which seem 
absolutely perfect, and which have found their way into the hymn-books of nearly 
every Christian Church. These are "The Lord my pasture shall prepare," "When 
all thy mercies, my God," "The spacious firmament on high," and "When rising 
from tbe bed of death." They were all publislied originally in The Spectator. 

Addison had considerable celebrity in his day as a writer of Latin. His Odes in that 
language are highly commended hy the crjtics. 

Eustace Budgell, 1685-1736, a writer contemporary with Pope and Addison, con- 
tributed about forty papers to The Spectator, some to The Guardian and The Tatler, 
and published for some time a weekly magazine of his own. The Bee. He published 
also Memoirs of the Family of the Boyles, and some other things. 

Steele. 

Sir Richard Steele, 1671-1729, is the writer of this age 
who comes nearest to the peculiar qualities and the match- 
less excellence of Addison. Like Addison, too, Steele's 
chief distinction is as an Essayist. In the Tatler, Spectator, 



THE PEOSE WRITERS. 231 

and Guardian, Steele's papers rank very little below those 
of his great compeer. If Addison is clearly the first, Steele 
is with equal clearness the second, of English Essayists. 

Early Career. — Steele was a native of Ireland. He was educated 
at the Charter-house School, and afterwards at Oxford, but did not ob- 
tain his degree. He enlisted in the Horse Guards, and rose to the rank 
of Captain. During this period of his life, and also subsequently, 
though in a less degree, he was idle, dissipated, and extravagant. 
Through the influence of Addison, who had been his school-friend, he 
obtained the position of Gazetteer. He married a West India lady, 
who lived only a few months. In 1707, he was married again, this 
time to Mary Scurlock, of Wales, who figures so prominently in his 
correspondence. Steele continued his extravagances, and became in- 
volved more and more in debt. 

Literary Undertakings. — In 1709, Steele began The Tatler, which 
was followed by The Spectator and The Guardian. In these several 
undertakings he was largely assisted by Addison, and in The Specta- 
tor the latter' s share was, it is well known, the largest. 

Political Course. — Steele was throughout those troublous times a 
consistent Whig. A member of the House, he was expelled for his 
political pamphlet entitled The Crisis, in which he set forth freely the 
great dangers to which the Protestant cause was exposed. On the ac- 
cession of the House of Hanover, Steele came into favor, was returned 
to Parliament, and made a baronet. On the occasion of the attempted 
passage of the notorious Peerage-Bill, limiting the power of royalty to 
create new peers, Steele took direct issue with his old friend Addison 
against the measure. 

3Ierits as an Author . — As an author Steele's reputation rests chiefly upon his 
essays. His comedies ^-ere comparatively unsuccessful. The Funeral, or Grief a la 
Mode, The Tender Husband, and The Conscious Lovers are the best. But as an essay- 
ist his fame -will be lasting. To The Tatler, The Spectator, and The Guardian he con- 
tributed respectively 1S8, 240, and 82 papers. He and Addison may be justly regarded 
as the founders of the easy and graceful essay style of English prose, equally removed 
from the weighty and involved periods of Milton and the puerile conceits of the Res- 
toration. 

"The Essays of Steele have eclipsed his dramas. His Bickerstaff. the Spectator 
Club, allegories, and short tales have the true, ever-living dramatic spirit. In taste 
and delicate humor he was greatly inferior to Addison. But in invention and insight 
into human character and motives he was fully his equal. He knew the world better, 
and fully sympathized with almost every phase of life and character except meanness 
and cruelty. He seems to have considered it his special mission to reform the minor 
vices and absurdities of English society. Had his satire been more keen and trench- 



232 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPOEAEIES. 

ant, or his moral lessons more formal and didactic, he could not have succeeded as he 
did ; his essays Avere just adapted to the times — they insinuated morality and benevo- 
lence, and supplied innocent enjoyment mingled with instruction. The lively, natural 
writer and companion is never lost in the teacher, nor the gay captain of horse wholly 
absorbed in the author." — Chambers. 



Swift. 

Jonathan Swift, 1667-1745, was, of all the writers of the 
age in which he lived, the one possessing the greatest origi- 
nality and power. His peculiarities, however, both as a 
writer and as a man, were no less marked, and mostly not of 
an agreeable character. Hence he has been, deservedly, less 
esteemed than most of his distinguished contemporaries, by 
those who have been free to admit his transcendent abilities. 

Early Career. — This unique personage in English letters was born 
in Dublin, of English parents, several months after the death of his 
father. Young Swift was supported by relatives, and sent by them to 
school and afterwards to Trinity College, Dublin. Here he did not 
improve his time after the orthodox fashion, but was chiefly occupied 
in writing political and personal satires. After remaining seven years 
at college he removed to England, and entered the service of Sir Wil- 
liam Temple, who was a distant relative, as private secretary. He 
remained in this position about ten years. It was a period of weari- 
some, galling poverty and dependence. At Temple's death, in 1698, 
Swift succeeded in obtaining the vicarage of Laracor, and one or two 
other small appointments, in Ireland. 

Life as an Author. — In 1701 Swift published a tract on The Con- 
tests and Discussions between the Nobles and Commons of Athens and 
Eome. This attracted the attention of Somers and Addison, then 
leaders of the Whig party. In 1704 he published The Tale of a Tub 
and The Battle of the Books. Swift's hopes of preferment not being 
gratified by the Whig party, he went over to the Tories. For nearly 
a year he edited The Examiner, and indulged his powers of satire in 
attacking Godolphin and Marlborough. He also became intimate with 
Bolingbroke, Oxford, and Pope. By his able pamphlet " On the Con- 
duct of the Allies," he contributed efficiently to the adoption of the 
peace of Utrecht, and gained for himself the preferment of Dean of 
St. Patrick's, in Dublin, 1713. 

Interest in Irish Affairs. — After the downfall of the Tory ministry. 
Swift identified himself with Ireland and the Irish cause. In 1724 



THE PEOSE WEITEES. 233 

appeared the Drapier Letters, which produced great excitement, and 
caused the English Government to abandon its scheme of flooding Ire- 
land with copper coinage. These Letters appeared anonymously, and 
the secret was preserved, in spite of the £300 reward offered by the 
Government for the detection of the author. In 1726 Swift revisited 
England, and published Gulliver's Travels. 

Loss of Health. — In 1727, having returned to Ireland, his health 
gave way and with it his mental faculties. He had some lucid inter- 
vals subsequently, during which he wrote A Khapsody on Poetry, the 
Legion Club, some verses on his own death, and The Modest Proposal. 
This last was an ironical satire on the English government of Ireland, 
in which the author gravely proposes to relieve the public distress by 
making the children of the poor serve as food for the rich. For the 
last two or three years of his life he was hopelessly insanCo 

IiOve'IAfe. — Any sketch, lioweyer brief, of Swift's career, would be incomplete 
without making some mention of his love-affairs. With all his brusi^ueness and prone- 
ness to satire, Swift appears to have exercised considerable powers of fascination over 
the other sex. There are three women, however, who figure conspicuously in the 
record of his life — Stella, Varina, and Vanessa. Vurina, the fictitious name of Miss 
Jane Warying, was a young lady who at first rejected Swift's olfer of marriage, but 
subsequently repented and renewed the proposal herself Swift replied, however, with 
a refusal as decided as her own. Stella. Miss Esther Johnson, had been a waiting-maid 
of Lady Gifford, Temple's sister, residing with him. Swift, as Temple's secretary, had 
opportunities of daily intercourse with Esther, then a very young girl, and directed 
her studies. The attachment between them was deep and lasting, — it might almost 
be called an English version of the loves of Abelard and Eloise, — and it is generally 
believed that they were privatelj' mai'ried in 1716. This has been doubted, however, 
by some writers. She followed him in 1700 to Ireland and presided at his table Avhen 
guests were present. She died in 1728. There is still much mystery hanging over this 
connection between Swift and Stella. The third lady, F«?!es.sa, Miss Julia Vanhomrigh, 
was the daughter of a family in London where Swift was on terms of intimate friend- 
ship before his appointment to St. Patrick's. As in the case of Stella, Swift directed 
her studies, and the young pupil became so enamored of her master as to make a pro- 
posal of marriage. These advances Swift neither encouraged nor absolutely repelled. 
Consequently, on her mother's death in 1714, Vanessa removed also to Ireland, and 
thus S\yift found himself in the awkward predicament of having two ardent admirers 
at once and in the same place. It is said that Stella, moved by jealousy of her rival, 
insisted upon a private marriage, and that Vanessa, having suspected as much, Avrote 
to Stella. This led to a violent explosion of wrath from Swift, and Vanessa died a few 
weeks afterwards, in 1722, of a broken heart. 

XTis Cfiaraeter hard to be TTnderstood. — There is, throughout Swiffs entire 
career, and especially this phase of it, much that is to us incomprehensible. Ilis 
vagaries and moodiness and reckless defiance of public opinion, however, were largely 
due to incipient insanity, and this may dispose us to be charitable in our judgment. 
Swift is one of those weird, demoniacal characters that are ever reappearing under 
various shapes and in various countries, doomed to see their wonderful gifts employed 
only in the destruction of themselves and thoae wlioui they bL'st lovo. 

20* 



234 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

CJiaracter as a Writer. — As a writer. Swift is without a parallel iu English 
letters. No one since the days of Kabelais.has equalled him iu humor and satire, 
unless we except Voltaire and Heine. His stj'le is a model of clear, forcible expres- 
sion, displaying a consummate knowledge of the foibles and vices of mankind. He 
has no sympathy with the grander flights of the imagination; he never rises above 
the earth. But in his sphere he is inimitable. Much of the coarseness that disfigures 
his writings is due to the spirit of the age — but not all. Swift would have been coarse 
in any age. Gulliver's Travels is his greatest and most popular work, but, in the 
opinion of Hallam, the Tale of a Tub is the best. His poem Cadenus and Yanessa 
gives an account of the early stages of his love-affair with Miss Tanhomrigh. The 
word Cadenus is a mere transposition of the Latin word decnnns, dean. In his manners 
Swift was taciturn and unmoved, even amidst the laughter that his own liumor had 
produced, sparing no one with his satire, yet of a not unkindly disposition to those 
who knew him well, and as shrewd and original in his couversation as iu his writings. 

John Arbuthnot, M. D., 1675-1734, was one of that bril- 
liant circle of authors and wits, of which Pope and Swift 
were the central jSgures. 

The Scriblerus Club, formed in 1714, counted among its members 
Arbuthnot, Swift, Pope, Gray, Congreve, Atterburv, and Harlev. Their 
object, according to Pope, was " to ridicule all the false tastes in learning, 
under the character of a man of capacity enough, that had dipped into 
every art and science, but injudiciously in each." The club did not 
continue long, but it gave birth to the following works : The First Book 
of Martinus Scriblerus (by Arbuthnot) ; The Travels of Gulliver (by 
Swift) ; and The Art of Sinking (by Pope). 

WorJcs. — Arbuthnot's first publication was An Examination of Dr. Woodward's 
Account of the Earth, and it brought him at once into notice as a first-class writer. 
His next productions were: On the Usefulness of Mathematical Learning, and On the 
Regularity of the Births of Both Sexes. His most brilliant performance was a work 
of humor, entitled The History of John Bull, and intended to ridicule the Duke of 
Marlborough. " Never was a political allegory managed with more exquisite humor, 
or with a more skilful adaptation of character and circumstances." 

Poptdaritif. — Arbuthnot was a general favorite among the brilliant authors with 
whom he was associated. They were filled Avith jealousies of each other, but they all 
speak in terms of admiration and kindness of him. "He has more wit than we all 
hare, and his humanity is equal to his wit." — Sicift. " His good morals were equal to 
any man's, but his wit and humor superior to all mankind." — Pope. Dr. Johnson, re- 
ferring back to this circle of eminent writers, says, "I think Dr. Arbuthnot the first 
man among them. He was the most universal genius, being an excellent physician, 
a man of deep learning, and a man of much humor." 

Shaftesbuky. — Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftes- 
bury, 1671-1713, was a statesman and writer of illustrious 
descent, and of equally illustrious abilities. 



THE PEOSE ^VEITEES. 235 

"Works. — Shaftesbury's -v^ritings are numerous, and liave been held 
in high estimation, notwithstanding their faults of style. His best 
known work is Characteristics of Men, Matters, Opinions, and Times, 
3 vols., 8vo. He wrote also The Moralist, a Philosophical Ehapsodv ; 
Letters concerning Enthusiasm ; Advice to an Author ; Letters by a 
Is oble Lord to a Young Man at the L'niversity ; A Letter from a Per- 
son of Quality to his Friend in the Country ; Essay on the Freedom 
of Wit and Humor ; On the Judgment of Hercules ; Liquiry concern- 
mg Virtue, etc. 

Sbaftesbtiry was educated under the special care of John Locke. As a statesman, 
he was much trusted by King William. Warburton scented infidelity in the Charac- 
teristics, but the sober judgment of subsequent and abler critics has not confirmed 
the suspicion. '■ Perhaps there is scarcely any composition of our language more lofty 
in its moral and religious sentiments and more exquisitely eloquent and musical iu 
its diction [than the Moralist]."^&> James Mackintosh. 

Shaftesbury's chief fault of style is a want of simplicity : " His lordship can ex- 
press nothing with simplicity. He seems to have considered it vulgar, and beneath 
the dignity of a man of quality, to speak like other men." — Blair. 

Bolingbroke. 

Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke, 1678-1751, was 
a political writer and speaker, contemporaneous with Pope, 
Swift, and Addison. 

Character. — Bolingbroke, if not the ablest and most profound, "^as 
at least the most brilliant of the illustrious company of authors that 
flourished in the early part of the eighteenth century. He owed no 
little of his celebrity, in his own time, to his fascinating manners, the 
charm of his conversation, and even his personal beauty. It is not to 
be denied, however, that he had talents of a very high order, though 
he used them for ends thoroughly selfish and often ignoble, and he has 
left behind no monument of genius worthy of the large space which he 
occupied in the public estimation while he lived. His youth was no- 
torious for its profligacy and libertinism, his meridian of public life 
was one of splendid intrigue rather than of statesmanship, and he be- 
queathed in dying a postliumous work of an irreligious character, 
which he had not the courage to avow when living. 

PoUtlcnl Career. — Bolingbroke belonged to the political party which was op- 
posed to the Duke of Marlborough and to the Hanoverian succession. He reached 
various high ofiices, ending with that of Prime Minister, in the closing year of 
Queen Anne. On tlie death of the Queen, being accused of an attempt to bring back 
the Stuarts, he was driven into exile, and openly entered the service of the Pretender. 
He was impeached for treason and attainted, but was afterwards allowed to return to 
England and to regain his estates, though not to enter Parliament. 



236 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Worlcs. — Bolingbroke's literary executor, David Mallet, brought out a sumptuous 
edition of his lordship's works, in 1754, in 5 vols., 4to, besides 2 vols., 4to, additional, 
of Correspondence, State Papers, etc., which appeared in 1798. The works which 
obtained the greatest notoriety were The Idea of a Patriot King, Dissertations upon 
Parties, The State of Parties on the Accession of George I., The Spirit of Patriotism, 
The Study and Use of Histoi'y, Reflections upon Exile. 

tTofmson's Verdict. — In reference to the works of a sceptical kind which Boling- 
broke left to Mallet to be published posthumously. Dr. Johnson said : " Sir, he was a 
scoundrel and a coward : a scoundrel, for charging a blunderbuss against religion and 
morality; a coward, because he had not the resolution to fire it off himself, but left 
half a crown to a beggarly Scotchman to draw the trigger after his death." 

" Bolingbroke's abilities were exactly of that stamp which astonish and fascinate 
those who come into personal contact with their possessor, — more brilliant than 
solid, — more showy than substantial. His mind was not a profound one; but what 
it wanted in this respect was atoned for by its readiness and acuteness. He seemed to 
grasp everything by intuition, and no sooner had he made himself master of a propo- 
sition or an argument, than his astonishing memory enabled him to bring forth vast 
stores of information and illustration at a moment's warning. Endowed with a bril- 
liant imagination, a prodigious flow of words, a style which fascinates the reader by 
the incomparable beauty of the language and the bounding elasticity of the sentences, 
and an extraordinary power of presenting his conceptions in the clearest light — his 
contemporaries looked upon him as one of those rare beings who seem to be endowed 
with a nature superior to that of common mortality, and who stoop down to the world 
only to evince their mastery of all its lore, and their superiority to its inhabitants. 
But, dazzled as they were by the vast surface of the stream, they forgot to inquire 
into its depths. We, in modern times, who know nothing of the artificial splendor 
with which a ' form excelling human ' — a manner that seemed given to swaj' man- 
kind, and a most dazzling style of conversation — invested the name of Bolingbroke, 
are perhaps inclined, by the exaggeration of the praise once lavished on him, to do 
him but scanty justice." — Cunningham's Biog. Hist. 

Bishop Atterbury. — Prancis Atterbury, 1662-1732, 
Bishop of Rochester, was the intimate friend and associate 
of Swift, Pope, Bolingbroke, and the other eminent men 
of that day. 

Career and Character. — Being suspected of an intrigue to bring in 
the Pretender, on the death of Queen Anne, Atterbury was deprived 
of his offices and banished by George I., in 1722, and spent the remain- 
der of his days in exile. He was a man of brilliant parts, bold and 
self-reliant in temper, always ready to lend a hand in a literary or a 
political contest, and better fitted for such work probably than for that 
to which he was ordained. His sermons, however, are exceedingly 
able, and in a literary view are among the best that we have. He took 
an active part in the virulent controversy between Bentley and Boyle 
about the authenticity of the Epistles of Phalaris, more than half of 
Boyle's portion being written by Atterbury. He engaged actively also 
in the Convocation controversy against Burnet, Hoadley, and Wake. 



THE PROSE WRITERS. 237 

WorJes, — Atterbury's chief publications were: The Voice of the People no Voice 
of God; Rights, Powers, and Privileges of an English Convocation; -Sermons, Dis- 
courses, and Correspondence. He translated Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel into 
Latin verse. His Sermons and his Letters give him his best claim to a place in lit- 
erature. " His sermons, it must be confessed, are clear, forcible, and, though never 
sublime, occasionally eloquent and pathetic; and his letters, on which his fame as a 
writer must principally depend, are superior even to those of Pope." — Georgian Zra. 

Bishop Berkeley. 

George Berkeley, D. D., 1684-1753, Bishop of Cloyne, 
was highly distinguished as a philanthropist and a philo- 
sophical writer. 

Career. — Berkeley was a native of Ireland and a graduate of Trinity 
College, Dublin ; and the associate of Pope, Swift, Addison, Steele, At- 
terbury, and Arbutlinot. Among his philanthropic schemes was one 
for the conversion of the American savages, and as preparatory to this, 
the founding of a University in the Bermudas. He obtained a Parlia- 
mentary grant of £20,000 for this purpose, and several large private 
subscriptions. A charter was granted, providing for the appointment 
of a President and nine Fellows, The Queen offered Berkeley a Bish- 
opric, if he would remain at home, but he preferred the headship of 
his new College, and sailed for America. He remained, in Newport, 
R. I., for two years, waiting for the arrival of the money promised by 
the Government. Finding that it was not likely to come at all, he 
returned to England, leaving behind him in the new world pleasant 
memories of his sojourn. He preached much during his stay at New- 
port. To the libraries of Harvard and Yale he gave important dona- 
tions of books ; and to the former, for the establishment of scholarships 
in Latin and Greek, the farm of Whitehall which he had bought near 
Newport, and which has since become very valuable. The Berkleian 
scholars of Yale form a noble list of more than two hundred names, 
nearly one hundred of tliem ministers of the gospel, among them 
President Wheelock, the founder of Dartmouth. 

Worles. — Berkeley's writings were numerous. The works of greatest note were 
those in which he published his leading philosophical idea, denying the existence of 
matter. Tliis idea was first set forth in the New Theory of Vision, and then more 
fully in The Principles of Human Knowledge. Berkeley's theory was of course au 
easy subject for ridicule. 

" When Bishop Berkeley said ' there was no matter,' 
And proved it, 'twas no matter what he said." — Byron. 

An advocate of Berkeley's theory having been in conversation with Dr. Johnson, 



238 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

and being about to take his leave, Johnson said, " Pray, sir, dou't leave us : we may 
perhaps forget to think of you, and then you will cease to exist." 

Notwithstanding these squibs, the Bishop's essays made a profound impression, and 
modified perceptibly the current of metaphysical opinion, though his views did not 
meet general acceptance. 

Another work of his. The Minute Philosopher, written during his residence at New- 
port, is a defence of i-eligion against the various forms of infidelity, and is highly 
spoken of. The Analyst also is a work of the same kind, but addressed particularly to 
mathematicians. The Bishop published also several essays on the use of Tar Water, 
and had a renowned controversy on the subject. 

Hie JEstltnate of Him. — Berkeley is spoken of in terms of unwonted commenda- 
tion, not only by the disti uguished men of his own day, who seem to have been charmed 
by the benevolence and genial warmth of his private character, but by astute critics, 
such as Dugald Stewart and Sir James Mackintosh. " So much understanding, so 
much knowledge, so much innocence, and such humility, 1 did not think had been 
the portion of any but angels, till I saw this gentleman." — Atterburi/. "Of the ex- 
quisite grace and beauty of his diction, no man accustomed to English composition 
can need be informed. His works are, beyond dispute, the finest models of philo- 
sophical style since Cicero." — Mackintosh. 

No single writing of Berlveley's is so well known as the brief poem 
which he wrote under the enthusiasm excited by the prospect of his 
going to the new world to found his University. The last stanza seems 
to have been prophetic : 

Westward the course of empire takes its way ; ^ 

The four first acts already past, 
A fifth shall close the drama with the day ; y^ 

Time's noblest offspring is the last. 

Lord John Somers, 1650-1716, was a conspicuous lawyer and states- 
man of the age of the English Revolution. 

Career. — Somers studied at Oxford, was admitted to the bar, and was one of the 
counsel for the famous seven bishops, in 1681. In 1692 he became Attorney-General, 
and in 1697 was made Lord Chancellor, and raised to the peerage. He was afterwards 
deprived of his Chancellorship and impeached, but was acquitted. Somers was chair- 
man of the committee that drafted the celebrated Declaration of Right, in 1689. 

Works. — The works that Somers has left are scarcely proportionate to his great 
fame as a jurist. His speeches were never preserved. The most important of his pub- 
lished works are A Brief History of the Succession of the Crown, and The Security of 
Englishmen's Lives, a treatise on grand juries. Besides his graver works, Somers is 
the author of the translation of Dido's Epistle to ^neas, and of Plutarch's Alcibiades, 
in Tonson's English versions of Ovid and Plutarch. The Declaration of Right is con- 
jectured to have emanated wholly from him, and also King William's last Speech to 
Parliament. 

William Pulteney, Earl of Bath, 1682-1764, was a statesman of 
considerable note in the time of Walpole and Bolingbroke. 



THE PEOSE WRITERS. 239 

Pultenej wrote a number of political pamphlets, partly on the Na- 
tional Debt and the Sinking Fund, and partly on the partisanships of 
the day. He was remarkable for his Parliamentary eloquence, and, 
like most English statesmen, prided himself on his knowledge of the 
classics. 

"While Sir Kobert Walpole was prime minister, a question arose one day in the 
House between him and Pulteney, Earl of Bath. It related to a passage in Horace, on 
which they wagered a guinea. The bet was won by Pulteney ; and the identical guinea 
may still be seen in the British Museum, with the following note in the winner's own 
hand : ' This guinea I desire may be kept as an heirloom. It was won of Sir Robert 
"VValpole, in the House of Commons, he asserting the vei'se in Horace to be '■'■ Kulli 
pallescere culp?e," whereas I laid the wager of a guinea that it was '■'' Nulla pcdlescere 
culpa." He sent for the book, and, being convinced that he had lost, gave me this 
guinea. I told him I could take the money without a blush on my side, but believed 
it was the only money he ever gave in the House where the giver and receiver ought not 
to blush. This guinea, I hope, will prove to my posterity the use of knowing Latin 
and encourage them in their learning.' " — Brougham. 

Bentley. 

Kichard Bentley, D. D., 1661-1742, Master of TriDity 
College, and Regius Professor of Divinity, Cambridge, is 
probably the greatest classical critic that England has yet 
produced. He is often called The British Aristarchus. 

Bentley's chief work was his Dissertation upon the Epistles of Pha- 
laris, in which he undertook to prove that those and certain other oft 
quoted ancient documents were modern forgeries. The discussion ex- 
cited a furious controversy, in which nearly all the great scholars and 
wits of the nation were enrolled against him, — Boyle, Atterbury, Con- 
yers Middleton, Pope, Swift, and the whole posse of scholars hailing 
from Oxford, to which rival University Boyle, his nominal antagonist, 
belonged. Bentley held his ground single-handed against them all, 
and m the course of the argument displayed such amazing resources 
of learning, and such critical acumen, as raised him to the highest pin- 
nacle of fame as a classical scholar and a critic. 

Two other works of Bentley's which also gained him great applause, and for which 
his critical learning and abilities were well adapted, were his Editions of Horace and 
Terence. He began also a new critical edition of Homer, but did not live to com- 
plete it. His design was to restore to the text the old Greek Digamma, a letter which 
has been dropped in all modern editions of the poet. 

Merits as a Critic. — Bentley was the most skilful of all critics in the matter 
of conjectural emendation. He was bold even to audacity in this respect, and yet his 
most important emendations have stood the test of scnitiny, and have for the most part 
become a part of the received text of the authors so amended. He was not always so 



240 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

fortunate, however. He attempted in this wa}' the emendation of Paradise Lost, un- 
der the idea that those who transcribed the poem for the blind poet had mistaken his 
words. His attempt thus to improve the text of Milton was a signal and almost 
ridiculous failure. 

Bentley published also numerous Sermons and some other works ; but his Disserta- 
tions on the Epistles of Phalaris and his Editions of Horace and Terence form the 
enduring monument of his fame. 

Hon. Charles Boyle, 1676-1731, Earl of Orrery, and nephew of 
the celebrated philosopher, Eobert Boyle, was himself a man of dis- 
tinguished abilities, and was held in high estimation by the dignitaries 
at Oxford, and by Swift, Atterbury, Pope, and others. 

Boyle published an edition of the Epistles of Phalaris, and in an evilhour was tempted 
into a controversy with Bentley, in regard to their authenticity. Atterbury helped 
him in his defence, writing, it is supposed, the greater part of it, and all of that set 
joined in the hue and cry against the merciless critic. But jibes and sarcasms were 
no protection against the "swashing blows" delivered by Bentley. Besides his part 
in this celebrated controversy, Boyle wrote As you Find it, a Comed}' ; and some other 
pieces. 

John Boyle, 1707-1762, Earl of Cork and Orrery, and son of Charles Boyle, like his 
father, and like most of that noble family for several generations, gained for himself 
a name in the republic of letters. His chief publications were Poems to the Memory 
of the Duke of Buckingham ; Imitations of the OdfS of Horace; Translations of Pli- 
ny's Letters; Memoirs of Robei-t Gary, Earl of Monmouth; Letters from Italy; Re- 
marks on the Life and Writings of Dr. Jonathan Swift. The publication last named 
led to some controversy. The Earl had been Aery intimate with Swift, and in this 
work, written after Swift's death, made some revelations in regard to Swift which 
were censured as dishonorable and as a breach of confidence. Dr. Johnson, however, 
defends the Earl, and contends that the publication was due to the truth of history. 

Conyers Middleton, 1683-1750, was a voluminous writer, 
belonging to what may be called the quarrelsome class. 

Middleton studied at Cambridge, and took orders in the Church of 
England. In calling him quarrelsome, it is not meant to affirm that 
there was anything malicious in his disposition, but the fact -was, he 
never seemed so well suited as when he had put forward in a dogmatic 
and irritating manner some disputed point and thereby provoked vio- 
lent contradiction. 

Literary Quarrels. — 'Esirly in life Middleton had a quarrel, ending in a law- 
suit, with the renowned Bentley, concerning excessive fees demanded by the latter. 
Middleton became involved in a controversy with Bishop Pearce over some remarks 
of Middleton's upon Waterland's Vindication of Scripture, which controversy nearly 
cost him his i)lace as Librarian at Cambridge, on the ground of his unorthodox opin- 
ions. His celebrated treatise. Free Inquiry into the Mii'aculous Powers of the Chris- 
tian Church, was the cause of an angry dispute, and no sooner had this in a manner 
subsided than Middleton started a fresh commotion by his attack upon Bishop Sher- 
lock's theory of the chain of prophecy running throiigh the Old Testament. Of Mid- 



THE PROSE WRITERS. 241 

dleton's controversial writings as a whole, it may be said that they probably had no 
definite aim, as they certainly have not had any definite result. 

ELis Life of Cicero. — The author's fame rests chiefly upon his Life of Cicero, 
which was, until the appearance of Forsyth's Cicero, the standard work upon the sub- 
ject. Middleton's Cicero is an able and well-written biography, although open to 
criticism. The style is easy and vigorous, but disfigured here and there by the use 
of slang phrases. The chief objection to the conception of the work is that it extols 
Cicero unduly. 

De Foe. 
Daniel De Foe, 1661-1731, was the author of the world- 
renowned Kobinson Crusoe. 

Career. — De Foe was the son of a butcher, James Foe, the prefix 
being assumed by Daniel. He was educated among the dissenters, and 
was expected to become a minister, but he did not carry out the plans 
of his friends. He was for a time a soldier ; he was a political negotia- 
tor ; he engaged in several kinds of trade. But his chief occupation 
was that of authorship. 

The amount that he wrote was enormous. The complete edition of 
his works, by Walter Scott, was in 20 vols., 12mo. A large part of his 
writings was on political subjects. He entered freely into the discus- 
sion of public aflfairs, and not always on the winning side. The ups 
and downs of his own life were numerous and great : 

" No man hath tasted diiFering fortunes more ; 
And thirteen times I have been rich and poor. 
I have seen the rough side of life, as "well as the smooth ; and have, in 
less than half a year, tasted the difference between the closet of a King 
and the dungeon at Newgate." 

A. Piece of Irony. — One of De Foe's publications was the Shortest Way with the 
Dissenters. "In this playful piece of irony, the author gravely proposed, as the 
easiest and speediest way of ridding the land of Dissenters, to hang their ministers 
and banish the people. IJoth Churchmen and Dissenters viewed the whole matter ia 
a serious light ; and while many of the former applauded the author as a staunch and 
worthy Churchman, as many of the latter, filled with apprehensions dire, began to 
prepare for Tyburn and Smithfield." The House of Commons declared the book a 
libel, and ordered it to be burnt by the hangman, and the author to stand in the pilr 
lory. To this Pope refers : 

" Earless on high stood unabashed De Foe." — Tlie Dunciad. 
De Foe took the matter very coollj'-, and wrote an ode to the Pillory, 
" A hieroglyphic state-machine 
Condemned to punish fancy in." 

WorJcff. — De Foe's works number more than two hundred; all of them were on 
subjects of popular interest, and were at the time much read. He is now known, how- 
ever, almost exclusively as a novelist, and most of all by his one novel, The Adveij- 
21 Q 



242 POPE AND HIS CO N TEMPO K A PIES. 

tures of Robinson Crusoe. Of his other novels, the most noted are Moll Flanders, Col- 
onel Jack, Koxana, and Captain Singleton. 

"While all ages and descriptions of people hang delighted over Robinson Cnisoe, 
and shall continue to do so, we trust, while the world lasts, how lew comparativt4y 
will bear to be told, that there exist other fictitious narratives by the same writer. — 
four of them, at least, of no inferior interest, Roxana, Singleton, Moll Flanders, Colonel 
Jack, — all genuine offspring of the same father." — Charles Lamb. 

"We are compelled to regard him as a phenomenon, and to consider his genius as 
something rare and cui'ious, which it is impossible to assign to any class whatever. 
Throughout the ample stores of fiction in which our literature abounds, more than that 
of any other people, there are no works which at all resemble his, either in the design 
or the execution. Without any precursor in the strange and uncarved'path which he 
chose, and without a follower, he spun his web of coarse but original materials, which 
no mortal hud ever thought of using before ; and when he had done, it seems as though 
he had snapped the thread, and conveyed it beyond the reach of imitation. To have 
a train of followers is usually considered as adding to the reputation of a writet: it is 
a peculiar honor to De Foe that he had none. Wherever he has stolen a grace beyond 
the reach of art, wherever the vigor and freshness of nature are apparent, there he is 
inaccessible to imitation." — Retrospective Review. 

"Was there ever anything written by mere man that the reader wished longer, 
except Robinson Crusoe, Don Quixote, and The Pilgrim's Progress ? " — Dr. Johnson. 

WiLiiiAM WoLL ASTON, 1659-1724, a clergyman of leisure, edu- 
cated at Cambridge, published in 1722 a work called The Eeligion of 
Nature, which was much read, and is often quoted in religious and 
philosophical treatises of the eighteenth century. 

Wollaston wrote other things, but this is the only one by which he is known. In it 
he maintains that Truth is the supreme good, and the source of all morality, laying 
down, as a foundation of his argument, that every action is a good one which ex- 
in act a true proposition. 



Samuel Clarke, D. D., 1G75-1729, was a celebrated philosophical writer. His chief 
book was his Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, being one of the 
Boyle courses of Lectures. This Avork is intended as a confutation of the works of 
Spinoza and Hobbes. He wrote also The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity, and some 
other works. 

JoH^^ NoRKis, 1657-1711, was a learned metaphysician and divine. He was a Pla- 
tonist in his views, and strongly inclined to mysticism. He wrote a treatise on the 
Platonic theory of innate ideas, advocating the system of Malebrauche on that subject, 
and arguing against the theory of Locke. The following are his chief publications: 
An Essay towards the Theory of the Ideal or Unintelligible World, considering it ab- 
solutely in Itself, 2 vols., 8vo ; A Philosophical Discourse concerning the Natural Im- 
mortality of the Soul ; Two Treatises concerning the Divine Light ; An Account of 
Reason and Faith ; Reason and Religion ; Christian Blessedness, or Practical Discourses 
on the Beatitudes ; An Idea of Happiness ; Miscellanies, consisting of Poems, Essays, 
Discourses, and Letters. 

" Norris is more thoroughly Platonic than Malebranche, to whom, however, he pays 
great deference, and adopts his fundamental hj'pothesis of seeing all things in God. 
He is a writer of fine genius, and a noble elevation of moral sentiments, such as pre- 
disposes men for the Platonig schemes pf thepspphy. He looked up to Augustine with 



THE PROSE WRITERS. 243 

as much veneration as to Plato, and respected more, perliaps, than Malebranche, cer- 
tainly more than the generality of English writers, the theological metaphysicians of 
the schools. With these he mingled some visions of a later mysticism. But his rea- 
sonings will seldom bear a close scrutiny." — Hallairi's Lit. Hist of Europe. 

JoHX Hutchinson, 1674-1737, was the founder of the Hutchinso- 
nian school of interpretation. 

Hutchinson was a native of Yorkshire. He was a layman, without 
the advantages of University education, but he acquired by private 
study a good deal of linguistic and scientific knowledge, and he wrote 
many works in support and illustration of a new scheme of biblical in- 
terpretation, which went by his name and was for a time much in vogue. 
The pivotal idea of his system was that the Hebrew Scriptures contain 
the elements of science and philosophy as weU as of religion, and that 
science is to be interpreted by the Bible. 

Worhs. — Hutchinson's principal works are the following: Moses's Principia; 
Moses sine Principio; The Confusion of Tongues and Trinity of the Gentiles; The 
Hebrew Writings Complete ; A Treatise on Power, Essential and Mechanical ; Glory 
of Gravity, Essential and Mechanical; Giory, Mechanical; The Human Frame, or 
Agents that circulate the Blood explained; the Religion of Satan, or Antichrist De- 
lineated, etc. 

" The works of Hutchinson are entitled to notice, as their author was the founder of 
a school of philosophy and theology to which some of the most celebrated men of the 
last century belonged. However absurd many of its speculations seem to be, there 
must be a plausibility in the leading principles of a system which engaged the atten- 
tion and support of such men as President Forbes and Bishop Home, Mr. Parkhurst 
and Bishop Horsley. The leading idea of Hutchinson is that the Hebrew Scriptures 
contain the elements of all rational philosophy as well as of genuine religion. That 
philosophy he opposes to the Newtonian; and hence he wrote his Moses's Principia, or 
a commentary on the Mosaic account of the creation and the deluge. His Moses sine 
Principio contains an account of the fall, and of other subjects connected with it. His 
work on the confusion of tongues is very ingenious ; in which he attempts to prove 
that it was not a diversity of languages, but of religion, that took place at Babel. His 
Trinity of the Gentiles gives a view of ancient mythology and idolatry, considered 
chiefly as a corruption of the true religion. In the Covenant of the Cherubim he gives 
a view of the perfection of the Hebrew Scriptures, and of the Covenant of the Divine 
Three for the redemption of man. Hutchinson is an obscure, and, at the same time, 
a most dogmatical and abusive writer. It is often exceedingly difficult to ascertain 
his meaning, and stiU more difficult to acquiesce in it when ascertained. That he and 
his sclioiars have contributed considerably to the interpretation of the Bible, it would 
be wrong to deny. They have done a good deal, at the same time, to injure and clog 
the science of criticism." — Ornie's Bibl. Bib. 

Andrew Wilsox, M.D., a Scotchrtian, and an advocate of the Hutchinsonian theo- 
ries, published, 1750-1767, several works on tliat subject, opposing the NcM'tonian Plii- 
losophy, and contending that all philosophy sliould be deduced from the Hebrew Bible : 
The Creation the Groundwork of Revelation, and Revelation the Language of Nature ; 
Human Nature Surveyed by Philosophy and Revelation; The Principles and Moving 



244 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Powers assumed by the Present System of Philosophy ; Subjects in Dispute between 
the Author of the Divine Legation of Moses [Warburton] and a Late Professor in the 
University of Oxford [Lowth]. Dr. Wilson published also several works on medical 
subjects. 

Francis Hutcheson, 1649-1747, was a metaphysical writer of 
considerable celebrity. 

Hutcheson was a native of the north of Ireland, and a graduate of the University 
of Glasgow. He was Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Dublin. His 
writings on metaphysical science, though not numerous, exerted a large influence by 
their originality and the clearness and beauty with which his thoughts were presented. 
He is even sometimes considered as the founder of the modern Scottish school of phi- 
losophy. The doctrine which he particularly advocated was the existence of an innate 
moral sense. His principal works are : A System of Moral Philosophy ; An Inquiry 
into the Originals of our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue ; An Essay on the Passions and 
Affections ; Letters on Virtue. 

David Hartley, M. D., 1705-1757, was a writer of some note on 
metaphysical science. 

Hartley was educated at Cambridge. He is the author of several medical treatises, 
but is best known by his Observations on Man, his Frame, etc., and by his Theory of 
the Human Mind. This theory regards the brain, nerves, and spinal chord as the direct 
Instruments of sensation, by means of vibrations communicated to and through them 
by external objects. Although overthrown subsequently, the theory is still interest- 
ing as marking an important step in the investigation of psychological phenomena. 

Sir Isaac Newton, 1642-1727, does not belong, strictly speaking, 
to the department of English literature, inasmuch as nearly all his 
most celebrated works were published in Latin. 

Newton's English works are : A Treatise on the Reflections, etc , of Light, Observa- 
tions on the Prophecies of Daniel, etc., and Historic Account of Two Notable Corrup- 
tions of Scripture (on the reading of 1 John v. 7, and 1 Tim. iii. 16). Sir Isaac New- 
ton is the most distinguished name in the annals of English science. It is not too 
much to say that his great discoveries in the laws of gravitation and of light, and hia 
invention of the system of fluxions, reconstructed all the processes of scientific inves- 
tigation hitherto employed, and placed them upon a broad and stable basis. His labors 
as a Bible critic cannot claim the same honor, and are of little value as compared with 
the results of modern exegesis. 

"William Whiston, 1667-1752, notorious in his own day for his 
theological heresies, and the persecution and controversy to which they 
gave rise, is now chiefly known for his translation of Josephus. 

Whiston was educated at Cambridge, where he became tutor, fellow, and finally 
successor to Sir Isaac Newton in the professorship of Mathematics. He was expelled 
from the University in 1710, in consequence of his Ariauism and his rejection of in- 
fant baptism. Whiston's works are exceedingly numerous, but are chiefly scientific 



THE PROSE WRITERS. 245 

or theological. His New Theory of the Earth, (a defence of the Mosaic account,) at- 
tracted much attention wlien it appeared, but is now wholly worthless. 

The remainder of "VVhiston's life, after his expulsion from the University, was spent 
in writing and publishing works in defence of Arianism. An attempt to expel him 
from the communion of the Church of England was made, and was continued for five 
years, but failed. This suit forms a curious chapter in the history of the times. 

}Vor ks. — Vi'histons theological works are now almost forgotten, and he is remem- 
bered almost exclusively by his translation of Josephus. This translation has gone 
through a number of editions, and is still much read, although superseded by the 
work of Dr. Robert Traill. Whistou's Autobiography is a curious record of the times, 
and displays the author in all his disinterested zeal and curious proneness to super- 
stition. 

Et. Hon. Duncan Forbes, 1685-1747, a distinguished Scotch scholar and adyocate, 
studied at Edinburgh, Utrecht, Leyden, and Paris, and rose to high distinction in civil 
affairs. He wrote Thoughts on Religion, Natural and Revealed ; Reflections on the 
Sources of Incredulity with regard to Religion ; Letters on some Important Discover- 
ies in Philosophy and Theology, etc. " I knew and venerated the man ; one of the 
greatest that ever Scotland had, both as a judge, a patriot, and a Christian." — 
Wa)-burton. 

John Asgill, 1738, was the author of a number of books, chiefly legal. For one 

of his books, entitled Argument proving that men may be translated to Heaven with- 
out dying, he suffered much persecution. It was regarded as impious, and on account 
of it he was expelled first from the Irish House of Commons, and then from the Eng- 
lish, and finally he hij for thirty years in prison. The quotations from the book given 
by Soiithey in The Doctor convict the author of absurdity i-ather than of blasphemy. 
He berated men for dying, when, as he said, there was no necessity for it; it was 
merely a foolish custom into which they had fallen ! As he himself lived to be almost 
a hundred years old, some people began to think that possibly there might be some- 
thing in his theory. But finally he knocked it all in the head by dj'ing himself, just 
like other people. 

Anthont Collins, 1676-1729, a writer on Theology and Metaphysics. TTorks : Essay 
concerning the Use of Reason; Priestcraft in Perfection; Tindication of the Divine 
Attributes: Discourse on Free Thinking; Philosophical Inquiry concerning Human 
Liberty and Necessity ; A Discourse of the Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Re- 
ligion, etc. Collins was a Deist, and an acute and subtle disputant. His opponents 
were some of the greatest men of his time, Bentley, Sam. Clarke, Shei'lock, and others. 

John Toland, 1669-1722, another of the deisticai writers of England at the beginning 
of the last century, was born in Londonderry, Ireland. He was of Catholic parentage ; 
but in his sixteenth year became a Protestant, and afterwards a Deist, or rather a 
Pantheist. He studied at the Universities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Leyden, and 
afterwards spent much time in literary research at Oxford. His chief work was 
Christianity not Mysterious, published in 1696. 

Matthew Tindal, LL.D., 1657-1733, was the leading deisticai writer at the close of 
the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century. He was educated at 
Oxford, and was elected to a Law Fellowship there. He resided chieflj' in London. lie 
published several works, but the only one much known is that entitled Christianity 
aa Old as the Creation, or the Gospel a Republication of the Law of Nature. It ere- 

21 ii 



24G POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

ated great controversy, and was the chief object had in view by Butler in writing hia 
Analogy. 

Nicholas Tindal, 1687-1774, nephew of the deistical writer, Matthew Tindal, trans- 
lated Rapin's History of England from the French to the English, and continnr-d 
it to his own time. Tindal's Rapin, published formerly in 5 vols., fol., and latterly in 
21 vols., 8vo., is a valuable thesaurus of facts, but heavy in style, and consequently 
not much read except by profound students of history. Tindal was the author of sev- 
eral works, but this was the chief. 

Charles Davenant, LL.D., 1656-1714, had considerable notoriety in his day as a 
dramatist and a writer on political economy. His Tragedy of Circe was written at 
the age of nineteen, and he himself took part in the performance of it. His works 
were published in 5 vols., 8vo. The following are the titles of some of tliem : An Es- 
say on the Ways and Means of Supplying the War; An Essay on the Trade of India; 
Discourses on the Public Revenues, etc., etc. 

Mrs. Mary Astell, 1668-1731, was one of the earliest of 
her sex in England to gain celebrity by the pen. 

Mrs. Astell wrote a number of works, which were well received <and 
gained for her the respect of some of the most distinguished persons 
of her day. Her works are partly of a religious kind, and partly 
directed to the improvement and elevation of her own sex. One of 
her works, Reflections on ]Marriage, is said to have been occasioned by 
a disappointment of her own on that subject, and betrays, not unnatu- 
rally, some acerbity of temper. "Some people [men?] think that she 
has carried her arguments with regard to the birthrights and privileges 
of her sex a little too far ; and that there is too much warmth of tem- 
per discovered in this treatise." The old story ! 

Another of her books was Six Familiar Essays upon Marriage, Crosses in Love, and 
Friendship. Another, "a witty piece," was an Essay in Defence of the Female Sex. 
The titles of some of her other works are : A Serious Proposal to the Ladies for the 
Advancement of their True and Greatest Interest, A Fair Way with Dissenters and 
their Patrons, Letters concerning the Love of God, Bart'lemy Fair, or an Inquiry after 
Wit, The Christian Religion as practised by a Daughter of the Church of England. 
The last named work was for a time attributed to Bishop Atterbury. 

"Mrs. Astell was a truly exemplary character, and devoted her talent to the best 
ends, the interests of true religion, and the improvement of her own sex; indeed, of 
all capable of appreciating moral excellence and intellectual elevation." — AUihone. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Eowe, 1674-1737, was another lady writer of 
some note. 

Mrs. Rowe was the daughter of a Dissenting minister, Walter Singer, and was noted 
at an early age for her beauty and accomplishments. She had Matthew Prior for a 
suitor, Bishop Ken and Dr. Watts for advisers, and no lack of adulation and compli- 
ment. She was married at the age of thirty-six to Mr. Thomas Rowe, a gentleman a 



THE PROSE WKITERS. 247 

little turned of twenty. The marriage was a happy one, and on the death of Mr, 
Rowe, at the age of twenty-eight, she remained a widow. Mrs. Rowe published many 
works, all of a religious character. The principal are : Devout Exercises of the Heart 
in Meditation, Soliloquy, Praise, and Prayer; Letters, Moral and Entertaining; Poems 
on Various Occasions. 

Bernard de Mandeville, 1670-1733, was a native of Holland, who finally settled 
in London. He was the author of a number of miscellaneous works in prose and 
verse, but is chiefly known by his Gambling Hive, 1714. This work having been se- 
verely censured, he published a new edition in 1723, enlarged, and furnished with 
notes, under the title. The Fable of the Bees, or Private Vices Public Benefits. It 
abounds in shrewd observations, and the style is vigorous, but is founded upon the 
paradox that private vices ^re public benefits. As Dr. Johnson shrewdly observed, 
"the fallacy of the book is that Mandeville defines neither vices nor benefits." The 
aiithor reasons well on the motives of human action, and his analysis of character is 
close. 

Jonathan Richardson, 1665-1745 ; a prominent portrait-painter of the eighteenth 
century, is better known, however, as an art-critic than as a painter. His chief works 
are an Essay on the Theory of Painting, which exercised a decisive influence on the 
development of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Two Discourses on the Art of Criticism. In 
connection with his son, he also published a volume of notes on Milton's Paradise 
Lost, with a likeness of the poet. This engraving, made by Richardson himself, 
is said to bear a striking resemblance to Wordsworth, and to be a better likeness of 
him than any of those made expressly for him. Richardson's poems have no great 
merit. 

Lewis Theobald, 1744, is chiefly known as one of the early editors of Shake- 
speare, and as one of the heroes of the Dunciad. He possessed much industry, and 
was conscientiously accurate, but had little taste and no genius. He published 
an edition of Shakespeare in 7 vols., 8vo, which is of considerable value, and exposed 
therein many of the inaccuracies of Pope, for which Pope took exemplary vengeance 
in the Dunciad. 

Aaron Hill, 1685-1750, published a number of writings on a great variety of sub- 
jects, historical, poetical, politico-economical. He is principally known by his Pro- 
gress of Wit, a satire aimed at Pope, who had introduced Hill into the Dunciad. 

Thomas Sprat, 1636-1713, is one of the minor authors of this 
period. He wrote both prose and verse, and is chiefly known by the 
latter, though his merits as a poet are much inferior to his merits as a 
prose writer. 

Sprat studied at Oxford, and took orders in the Church of England, finally becom- 
ing Bishop of Rochester. He is the author of several works, both in prose and verse. 
The latter are of little merit. They are An Account of the Plague of Athens, and a 
Poem on the Death of Oliver Cromwell. His prose works are a History of the Royal 
Society of London, etc., A True Account of the [Rye House] Conspiracy, etc., and 
several volumes of sermons and discourses to the clergy, which have been highly 
praised. 



248 POPE AlNiD HIS CONTEMPORAEIES. 

"Unhappily for his fame, it has been usual to print his verses in Collections of the 
British poets ; and those who judge of him by his verses must consider him as a servile 
imitator, who, without one spark of Cowley's admirable genius, mimicked whatever 
was least commendable in Cowley's manner; but those who are acquainted with 
Sprat's prose writings will form a very different estimate of his powers. He was, in- 
deed, a great master of our language, and possessed at once the eloquence of the 
author, of the controversialist, and of the historian." — Macaulay. 

John Sheffield, Earl of Musgrave, Duke of Buckinghamshire, 1649-1720, a promi- 
nent English statesiiian of this period, was the author of several works which were 
much praised at the time, but which are now comparatively unknown. The principal 
one is an Essay on Poetry, in which Dryden was for awhile supposed to have had a 
share. Besides this, Sheffield published two Dramas — Julius C«sar and Marius Bru- 
tus — mere altei-ations of Shakespeare. 

Simon Ocklet, 1678-1720, a clergyman of the Church of England and Professor of 
Arabic at Cambridge, was the author of several works upon oriental literature and 
history. He is known almost exclusively, however, by his History of the Conquests 
of the Saracens. Although oriental studies have made immense progress since the 
eighteenth century, Ockley's work still retains a large share of its original value. It 
was the work which Gibbon chiefly consulted for information upon Saracenic con- 
quests. "The very curious history of the Saracens, given by Ockley, should be con- 
sulted, and is somewhat necessary to enable the student more exactlj' to comprehend 
the character of the Arabians, which is there displayed, by their own writers, in all 
its singularities." — Smyth. 

John Olpmixon, 1673-1742, was the author of a number of historical works : The 
Bi-itish Empire in North America, History of England, Clarendon and "Whitlock com- 
pared, etc. Oldmixon is so bigoted a Whig that writers of even his own party,Macaulay, 
for instance, reject his works as of no authority. His Prose Essay on Criticism had 
uo other effect than to elicit from Pope a satirical passage in the Dunciad. 

Thomas Salmon, 1742, was an English historian of some note. His principal 

>vorks are Modern History, in 32 vols., published in 1725, and his Abridgment and Re- 
view of State Trials from Richard II. to George II. His Modern History was much 
read in its day, and has been made the text for numerous abridgments since. 

Robert Wodrow, 1679-1734, the historian of the Church of Scotland, was born and 
educated at Glasgow, and was minister of Eastwood from 1703 to his death in 1734. 
His chief work was A History of the Sufferings o!the Church of Scotland, 2 vols., fol. 
Besides this, he published A Life of James Wodrow, Professor of Divinity at Glasgow 
and father of Robert; Analecta, materials for a history of remarkable providences; 
and numerous other Collections, Letters, jetc. 

Thomas Carte, 1686-1754, was a careful and voluminous writer of English history. 
He was suspected of being in collusion with the exiled Stuarts, and was obliged in 
consequence to flee from the country, but was permitted afterwards to return and com- 
plete his historical works. These were : History of the Life of James, Duke of Or- 
mond, 1610-1688, containing a full account of the Irish Rebellion, 3 vols., fol.: History 
of England, 4 vols.. 4to. Both these works were the fruit of original research, and 
are counted of great value for their facts, though the style is not such as to attract 



THE PROSE WRITERS. 249 

the general reader. " Carte's Life of the Duke of Ormond is considered a book of 
authority ; but it is ill written. The matter is diffused in too many words ; there is 
no animation, no compression, no vigor. Two good volumes in duodecimo might be 
made out of the two [three] in folio." — Dr. Johnson. 

George Sale, 16S0-1736, the distinguished orientalist, was by profession a lawyer. 
He contributed largely to Bower's Universal History, and to Birch's General Dic- 
tionary, but is chiefly known by one work, A Translation of the Koran. He was ex- 
tremely poor, and " often wandered in the streets in search of some compassionate 
friend who would supply him with the meal of the day."— i^isroeZi. 

Edward Spelmax, 1767, great-grandson of the celebrated antiquary. Sir Henry 

Spelman, is chiefly known by his translations of Xenophon's Anabasis and Cyro- 
paedia (pronounced by Gibbon, and lately by Dr. Smith, to be the best English ren- 
dering), and of The Roman Antiquities of Dionysius of Halicarnassus. Spelman also 
translated a Fragment of the Sixth Book of Polybius, and wrote a History of the 
Civil Vtaxs between York and Lancaster. 

JoHX Potter, D. D., 1674-17-1:7, Archbishop of Canterbury, was celebrated for his pro- 
found learning as a Greek scholar. His chief work, Archseologia Grseca, or The An- 
tiquities of Greece, in 2 vols., 8vo, was long the only standard text-book on this sub- 
ject. Some of his other publications are Theological Works, 3 vols , 8vo, containing 
Charges, Sermons, Addresses, etc.; Critical Editions of Clemens Alexaudrinus, Plu- 
tarch, and Lycophron. 

Robert Ainsworth, 1660-1743, has been well known to many successive generations 
of school-boys. For a full century, almost the only road to classical learning in Eng- 
land and America was by "Ainsworth's Latin Dictionary." This work, which cost 
the author twenty years of labor, was flrst published in 1737 ; it soon displaced those 
which had preceded it, and held undisputed sway among students of the English- 
speaking race until comparatively recent times. 

Nathan Bailey, 1742, -w^as author of the English 

Dictionary which was in current use previous to that of 
Dr. Johnson. 

Bailey's Dictionary was published in folio and in various other forms, 
and was for a long time almost the only acknowledged standard of the 
language. Mr. Bailey was a good philologist for that day, and his 
work was a worthy contribution to the cause of letters. 

Dr. AUibone records a curious anecdote in regard to Bailey's Dictionary. It was 
studied through twice, word by word, by Mr. Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatliam. the 
import and mode of construction of each word being carefully examined, so that the 
strength, the significance, and the beauty of the English language might be properly 
understood, and enlisted in the service of oratory when required. "Probably no 
man, since the days of Cicero, has ever submitted to an equal amount of ilrudgery." 
A somewhat similar stofy is told of Dr. Archibald Alexander, of Princeton. When 
M'ebster's large Dictionary was first published, in 1827, in 2 vols., 4to, Dr. Alexander 
is said to have read it regularly through, from beginning to end. Such was the tra- 
dition at the time among the college students. 



250 POPE AXD HIS COXTEMPOEARIES. 

La^^vkexce EchaPvD, 1671-1730, was a clergvman of the English. 
Cliiirch, and a writer of some note on history and geography. 

WorJis. — Compend of Geography: The Gazetteer, a Geographical Index to Eu- 
rope ; Classical Geography ; Roman History, 5 vols., 8to ; General Ecclesiastical His- 
tory, 2 vols., Syo ; History of England, 3 vols., folio. 

The work last named was for a time very popular, and bid fair to become a standard 
authority on the subject. But it was superseded by ITapier and others. The contrast 
between Echard"s history and that of Gilbert Burnet is thus sketched in a witty epi- 
gram of the day : 

GiTs History appears to me 

Political anatomy ; 

A case of skeletons well done. 

And malefactors every one. 

His sharp and strong incisive pen. 

Historically cuts up men, 

And does with lucid skill impart 

Their inward aUs of head and heart. 

Lawrence proceeds another way, 

And well-dressed figures does display; 

His characters are all in flesh, 

Their hands are fair, their faces fresh. 

And from his sweeting air derive 

A better scent than when alive. 

He wax-work made to please the sons 

TThose fathers were Gil's skeletons. 

Joseph Asies, 16S9-1759, is the author of an antiquarian work of considerable 
celebrity, called Typographical Antiquities, being an historical account of printing in 
England, with some memoirs of ancient printers, and a register of the works printed 
by them from 1471 to 1600. 3Ir. Ames was an ironmonger of London, who took a 
fancy for occupying his leisure hours in this kind of literary employment, and who 
produced, after years of laborious research, a work of real excellence for the time, 
though it has since been superseded by later works based upon it. 

Thomas Baker, 1656-1740, was one of those learned and laborious antiquaries for 
which England has always been famous. The only w-ork which he published was Re- 
flections on Learning. It had great popularity and passed through eight editions. 
He occupied himself through his long life in collecting and transcribing documents 
in regard to the history and antiquities of the University of Cambridge. His MSS. on 
this subject amount to 39 vols., fob, and 3 vols., 4to, besides large collections relative to 
other portions of English history. If he had undertaken less, and had stopped to ar- 
range and prepare for publication some portion of his accumulations, he would have 
done a greater service to letters. 

" As the employment [of antiquaries] consists first in collecting, and afterwards in 
arranging, or abstracting, what libraries afford them, they ought to amass no more 
than they can digest; but when they have undertaken a work, they go on searching 
and transcribing, call for new supplies — when they are alrAdy overburdened, and at 
last leave their work unfinished. It is the business of a good antiquary, as of a good 
man, to have mortality always before him." — Hearne. 

JoHX Lewis, 1675-1746, a clergyman of the Church of England, a native of Bristol 



THE PKOSE WRITEES. 251 

and a graduate of Oxford, wrote several -works on religious subjects, Baptism, The 
Litany, etc ; also several antiquarian works. History and Antiquities of the Isle of 
Thanet; History and Antiquities of the Abbey Church of Feversham ; Antiquity and 
Use of Seals, etc. But his chief claim to commemoration is his connection with the mem- 
ory of Wyckliffe. Rewrote A Life of John Wyckliffe, and he published an edition of 
Wyckliffe's New Testament, prefixing to it a History of the Translators of the Bible 
into English. Besides these valuable works, and in the same line with them, he wrote 
A Life of Master William Caxton. Lewis's style is disfigured by carelessness and 
want of order, but he has collected and transmitted, in these works, valuable 
materials. 

Sir John Chardin, 1643-1713, a celebrated traveller, a native of 
ParLs, but a resident of England, and laiighted by Charles II., wrote 
Travels into Persia and the East Indies. 

Chardin was a jeweller by trade, tind it Avas on this business partly that he went to 
Ispahan, where he remained for six years. He was employed by the King of Persia 
as an agent for the purchase of jewels. " The faculty of seizing, hy a rapid and com- 
prehensive glance, the character of a country and people, was possessed in the high- 
est degree by Chardin, and secures him an undisputed supremacy in that department 
of literature." — Sir James Mackintosh. 

John Whiting, 1655-1722, is chiefly known by his descriptive " Catalogue of Friends' 
Books." He was a native of Somersetshire, resident in London. Besides his " Cata- 
logue," Whiting published An Abstract of the Lives, Precepts, and Sayings of the 
Ancient Fathers ; Judas and the Chief Priests Conspiring to Betray Christ, an answer 
to George Keith; The Admonishers Admonished; Truth and Innocence Defended, an 
answer to Cotton Mather's " lies and abuses of the people called Quakei's," etc. 

JohnDunton, 1659-1733, was an eccentric man who turned his hand alternately to 
bookselling and bookmaking, and whose work of chief value is his own autobiogra- 
phy : Life and Errors of Johu Dunton, with Lives and Characters of more than a 
thousand contemporary divines. He published for twenty years The Athenian Mer- 
cury, somewhat on the plan of Notes and Queries ; also, Keligio Bibliopole, or Keli- 
gion of a Bookseller, etc. 

Edward Cave, 1691-1754, an English printer, is honorably connected with English 
literature as the originator of The Gentleman's Magazine, begun by him in 1731, and 
still continued on the same spot. Dr. Johnson, at the beginning of his career, drew 
his first support from this magazine. Edmund Burke also contributed largely to it. 

Edward Moore, 1712-1757, an unsuccessful linen-draper, turned his attention to 
literature, and with considerable success. He wrote Fables for the Female Sex ; The 
Foundling, and Gil Bias. Comedies; and The Gamester, a Tragedy. He also wrote a 
large number of the best papers in The World, a daily paper, of which he was for 
several years the editor. 

William Wotton, D. D., 1666-1726, wrote several works 
of value, but is chiefly noticeable for his extraordinary in- 
tellectual precocity. 



252 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPOEAEIES. 

There is not probably on record another authentic instance of such 
early intellectual development as that of AVotton. He translated 
chapters from the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin into English at the 
age of five. He was admitted to College, Catherine Hall, Cambridge, 
at the age of nine years and eight months, the record of him by the 
Head of the College being Gulieiinus Wottonus, infra decern annos, nee 
Hammondo nee Grotio secundus, " William Wotton, less than ten years 
old, and not inferior to Hammond or to Grotius." When scarcely 
twelve, his skill in Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac, Chaldee, Greek, and Latin, 
in arts, sciences, logic, philosophy, mathematics, and chronology', was 
celebrated by the learned Head of Magdalen College in a Latin poem, 
In Gulielmuni Wottonum, stupendi ingenii et ineomparahUis spei puerum, 
vixdam duodecim annorum, " On William Wotton, a boy of amazing 
genius and incomparable hope, not yet twelve years old." At the age 
of twelve years and five months he took his degree of Bachelor of Arts, 
being then acquainted with twelve languages. He took his Master's 
degree at seventeen, and was elected Fellow at nineteen. He did not 
die young, as is often the case with those of precocious genius, but 
lived to the age of sixty. 

Wotton wrote several important works, but his achievements were not in proportion 
to the prodigious promise of his boyhood. The following are the chief: Reflections 
upon Ancient and Modern Learning, occasioned by Sir William Temple's essay on that 
subject ; A History of Rome ; Discourse on the Confusion of Language at Babel ; Mis- 
cellaneous Discourses on the Traditions and Usages of the Scribes and Pharisees in 
the Time of Our Blessed Saviour Jesus Christ. 

Thomas Wilson, D. D., LL.D., 1663-1755, was for fifty-seven years 
Bishop of Sodor and Man. On account of his extraordinary merits, 
he received from the King frequent offers of promotion to other dio- 
ceses, generally considered more desirable, but he uniformly declined, 
and remained in his original Episcopal charge, fulfilling its duties, to 
the ninety -third year of his life. 

Bishop Wilson's publications are held in great respect : The Principles and Duties 
of Christianity; Short and Plain Instructions for the Better Understanding of the 
Lord's Supper; The Knowledge and Practice of Christianity made easy to the Meanest 
Capacities ; Observations on Reading the Historical Parts of the Old Testament ; Paro- 
chialia, instructions to the clergy in the discharge of their parochial duty; Maxims 
of Piety and Christianity ; Plain Sermons on the Sacraments ; Private Meditations. 

"During the fifty-eight years that he had the bishopric, he never failed, unless on 
occasion of sickness, to expound the Scriptures, to preach, or to administer the sacra- 
ment, every Sunday, at one or other of the churches in his diocese ; and if absent from 
the island, he always preached at the church where he resided for the day." — Life. 

" His style and language are adapted to the understanding and capacity of all orders 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 253 

and degrees of men : at the same time, he deliA'ered his sentiments with all the dignity 
and authority of an inspired apostle." — Rev. P. Moore. 

Thomas Rymer, 1638-1714, a scholar of Cambridge, Avas appointed in 1692 historiog- 
rapher to William III. In this capacity he published the collection of documents 
relating to the transactions between England and foreign powers, in twenty volumes 
folio, commonly known as Rymer' s Foedera. The last five volumes, it must be ob- 
served, were published by Sanderson after Rymer's death. The treaties in this work 
extend from 1101 to 1664. It is perhaps unnecessary to say that Rymer's Foedera is 
indispensable in the historian's library, Clark's attempt to amend and enlarge it hav- 
ing failed. It is, as yet, the only collection that gives, in an accessible and continuous 
form, the documents relating to England's foreign policy. Besides his labors as an 
editor, Rymer made some pretensions to being a critic, publishing a few essays on 
the English dramatists of the sixteenth century, which earned from Macaulay the epi- 
thet, "the worst critic that ever lived." Rymer made also a few translations from 
the Greek, Latin, and Italian. 

John Harris, D. D., 1667-1719, Avas the earliest English encyclopedist. He published 
in 1704 Lexicon Technicum, or a Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, 2 vols., 
fol. He made also a valuable collection of Voyages and Travels, 2 vols., fol., and some 
other antiquarian works. 

Ephraira Chambers, 1740, was the author of Cham- 
bers's Cyclopaedia. 

Chambers began as an apprentice with Mr. Sen ex, a globemaker in 
London. Acquiring, while in this business, a strong taste for scientific 
pursuits, he withdrew from the work of globemaking, and gave him- 
self up entirely to the preparation of his dictionarv. It Avas published 
by subscription, in 2 vols., fol., and had a large sale, bringing the author 
both money and fame. The work was enlarged from time to time, and 
finally led to, or was merged in, Kees's Cyclopaedia, 45 vols., 4to. 

"While the second edition of Chambers's Cyclopaedia, the pride of booksellers and 
the honor of the English nation, was in the press, I went to the author, and begged 
leave to add a single syllable to his magnificent work ; and that, for Cyclopfedia, he 
woTild write J?)icyclop<Edia. I told him that the addition of thf preposition en made 
the meaning of the word more precise ; but Cyclopsedia might mean the instruction 
of a circle, as Cyropjedia is the instruction of Cyrus ; but that if he Avrote Encyclo- 
psedia, it determined it to be from the dative of cyclus, — instruction in a circle." — 
W. Bowyer. 

IV. THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 

Butler. 

Joseph Butler, D.D., 1692-1752, a learned Bishop of the 
English Church, wrote several iniportant works, but the 
others are thrown into the shade by that one with which 
the world is familiar, The Analogy of Religion, Natural 
and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature. 
22 



254 POPE AND HIS COXTEMPOPvAEIES. 

Butler's Analogy lias been accepted almost universally as a standard 
work on the subject of which it treats, and it is used as a text-book in 
a large proportion of the higher institutions of learning. The distinc- 
tion which it has gained is due, however, more to the soundness of the 
argument than to the lucid or attractive style in which the argument 
is presented. It has been alleged, indeed, that the difficulty referred to 
is owing entirely to the abstruse character of the subjects discussed. 
But this is a mistake. His style is not to be commended or imitated. 
He is dry, obscure, and dull, where Locke, Berkeley, or Brown would 
have been vivacious and lucid. 

" No thinker so great was ever so bad a writer. Indeed, the ingenious apologies 
which have lately been attempted for this defect, amount to no more than that his 
power of thought was too much for his skill in language. How general must the 
reception have been of truths so certain and momentous as those contained in But- 
ler's discourses, — with how much more clearness must thej have appeared to his own 
great understanding, if he had possessed the strength and distinctness with which 
Hobbes enforces odious falsehood, or the unspeakable charm of that transparent dic- 
tion which clothed the unfruitful paradoxes of Berkeley." — Sir Jmnes Mackintosh. 

" Bishop Butler is one of those creative geniuses who give character to their times. 
His great work, The Analogy of Religion, has tixed the admiration of all competent 
judges for nearly a century, and Mill continue to be studied so long as the language 
in which he wrote endures." — Bishop Wilson. 

Leslie. 

Charles Leslie, 1650-1722, a native of Ireland, and a graduate 
of Trinity College, Dublin, was ordained in the English Church, but 
being a strong Jacobite, and refusing to take the oath of allegiance to 
AVilliam and Mary, he applied himself to the use of his pen only. 

Leslie wrote much, both on political and religious subjects. Of the latter, the works 
most known are A Short and Easy Method with the Deists ; A Short and Easy Method 
with the Jews ; and The Snake in the Grass, against the Quakers. His " Short and 
Easy Method with the Deists " has acquired great celebrity, and is always quoted in 
lists of works on the evidences of Christianity. 

"His abilities and his connections were such that he might easily have obtained 
high preferment in the Church of England. But he took his place in the front rank 
of the Jacobite body, and remained there steadfastly through all the dangers and vicis- 
situdes of three-and-thirty troubled years. Though constantly engaged in theological 
controversy with Deists, Jews, Socinians, Presbyterians, Papists, and Quakers, he found 
time to be one of the most voluminous political writers of the age. Of all the non- 
juring clergy he was the best qualified to discuss constitutional questions ; for before 
he had taken orders he had resided long in the Temple, and had been studying English 
history and law, while most of the other chiefs of the schism bad been puring over the 
Acts of Chalcedon, or seeking for wisdom in the Targum of Onkelos.'" — Jlacaulay. 

Thomas Sherlock, D. D., 1678-1761, a celebrated divine and Bishop of the English 
Church, was born in Loudon and educated at Cambridge. His Works complete are 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 255 

pTiblislied in 5 vols., «vo. The following are the two most noted: The Use and Intent 
of Prophecy; Trial of the Witness?s of the Resurrection of Jesus. "The Sermons of 
Sherloclv are masterpieces of argument and eloquence. His discourses on Prophecy 
and the Trial of the Witnesses are perhaps the best defences of Christianity in our 
language." — Dr. Joseph IVarton. 

Thomas Secker, LL. D., 1693-1768, Archbishop of Canterbury, was held in high 
esteem both as a writer and a preacher. His writings have been published in 12 vols., 
8vo. Of these, one volume consists of Charges to his clergy, and 2 vols, are Lectures 
on the Catechism ; the remaining nine are Sermons. 

Thomas Stackhouse, 1680-1752, a theologian of the English Church, is well known 
for his Complete Body of Divinity, published originally in folio, and more recently in 
3 vols., 8vo, and for his History of the Bible, published originally in 2 vols., folio, and 
afterwards in 6 vols., 8vo. Besides these, his chief works, he published also The Mis- 
eries and Great Hardships of the Inferior Clergy in and about London ; Reflections 
on the Nature and Property of Languages; Defence of the Christian Religion; Me- 
moirs of Bishop Atterbury, etc. The two works first named form a part of the stand- 
aid literature of theology. 

John Strtpe, 1643-1737, a learned clergyman of the English Church, was a most 
laborious student and writer. He died in his ninetj^-fifth year. His works have been 
printed in 27 vols., Svo. They are chiefly historical, and though valuable as store- 
houses of information, are of the Dryasdust order. The following are the chief: An- 
nuls of the Reformation in England, 4 vols., folio ; Ecclesiastical Memorials, 3 vols., 
folio ; Lives of Archbishops Cranmer, Grindal, Parker, and Whitgift, each in 1 vol., 
folio ; Lives of Bishop Aylmer, Svo, of Sir Thomas Smith, Svo, and of Sir John Cheke, 
4to, with a great number of Sermons. 

William Wake, D. D., 1657-1737, Archbishop of Canterbury, was born at Blandford, 
Dorsetshire, and educated at Oxford. He published An Exposition of the Doctrines 
of the Church of England ; Present State of the Controversies between the Churches 
of England and Rome; The Genuine Epistles of the Apostolical Fathers, Translated; 
The Authority of Christian Princes over their Ecclesiastical Synods ; An Appeal in 
behalf of the King's Supremacy ; Preparation for Death ; Sermons and Discourses. 

William Fleetwood, D. D., 1C56-1723, a Bishop of the English Church, was the author 
of several valuable works : Essay on Miracles; Chronicum Preciosum, an account of 
money, prices, etc.; Sermons. Bishop Fleetwood's Sermons are highly praised: "sur- 
named the silver-tongued ; — remarkable for easy and proper expressions." — Doddridge. 

White Kennett, D.D., 1660-1728, was an eminent Bishop of the English Church, and 
a zealous antiquary. His publications were very numerous. Among these the follow- 
ing are noted: Parochial Antiquities of Oxford and Bucks, 2 vols., 4to ; A Complete 
History of England, with the Lives of all the Kings and Queens thereof, 3 vols., fol. ; 
Register and Chronicle, Ecclesiastical and Civil, towards discovering and correcting 
the True History of England, from the Restoration of Charles II., fol., etc. 

John Balgut, 1686-1748, a theological writer who flourished in the early part of the 
last century, attacked Lord Shaftesbury in A Letter to a Deist. His other publica- 
tions were: The Foundation of Moral Goodness, being an answer to Iliitcheson's 
t'c'ory of the origin of our ideas of Beauty and Virtue ; Brief Intjuiry concerning the 
WiM-al Perfections of the Deity ; and An Essay on Redemption. The last was one of his 



256 POPE AXD HIS CONTEMPOBAEIES. 

most popular works. — Thomas Balguy, D. D., 1716-1795, son of John B., and archdea- 
con of Winchester, wrote several works on religious subjects : Divine Benevolence 
Asserted and Vindicated from the Reflections of Ancient and Modern Sceptics ; Dis- 
courses on Various Subjects. 

Rev. John Bampton, 1689-1751, has a place in English letters, not for what he did 
himself, but for what he has caused to he done by others. He left his estates in trust 
to the University of Oxford, for the endowment of eight Divinity Lectures, to be de- 
livered yearly, in confirmation and establishment of the Christian faith. These 
Bampton Lectures began in 1780, and a new volume has been published every year 
since, with only two or three exceptions. 

Richard Arnald, 1696-1756, a Fellow of Emanuel College, Cambridge, was the author 
of a Commentary on the Apocrypha, which is held in high estimation. This commen- 
tary is usually printed with those of Patrick, Lowth, and Whitby, the whole making 
a continued exposition of the whole of the Sacred A'olume. Arnald published several 
other treatises, chiefly theological, but the Commentary on the Apocrypha was his 
chief work. 

Thomas Bennett, 1673-1728, an eminent English divine, engaged largely in theologi- 
cal discussion. His works are directed chiefly' against the Catholics and the Quakers. 
Discourses on Schism ; A Confutation of Popery ; A Confutation of Quakerism ; A Brief 
History of Set Forms of Prayer ; Annotations on the Book of Common Prayer; Essay 
on the Articles. 

'Waterland. 

Daniel Wateeland, D. B., 1683-1740, is a standard writer on the 
Arian controversy. He was born in Lincolnshire, and educated at 
Cambridge. He held various ecclesiastical preferments, and was, at 
the time of his death, Archdeacon of Middlesex. 

Waterland's writings are mostly on the divinity of Christ, and are in high repute : 
Vindication of Christ's Divinity ; Defence of the Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ ; 
Case of Arian Subscription Considered; Critical History of the Athanasian Creed; 
Scripture Vindicated, an answer to Tindal's book " Christianity as old as the Crea- 
tion ; " Importance of the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity. Dr. Waterland also wrote 
on The Eucharist, and Regeneration. His Works have been printed in 12 vols., 8vo. 

Joseph Bingham, 1668-1723, one of the most learned and laborious of English divines. 
His great work, to the preparation of which he devoted more than twenty years of 
labor, was his Origines Sacrae, or The Antiquities of the Christian Church, in 10 vols, 
" It discovers a prodigious fund of reading, especially in the Fathers, united with great 
judgment, sincerity, and candor. It remains to the present day the text-book on the 
important subject of which it treats." — Darling. 

Henry Dodwell, 1641-1711, a native of Ireland, educated at Trinity College, Dublin, 
adopted London as his place of residence, and was chosen Professor of History at Ox- 
ford, lie was a man of great learning and industry. His most important works were 
in Latin. The following are his English works : Separation of Churches from Episco- 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 257 

pal Government Scliismatical ; Discourse concerning the One Altar and the One Priest- 
hood; A Discourse concerning the Soul, etc. This last advanced a curious theory, in 
some respects like that of the modern Annihilationists, and led to considerable con- 
troversy. — Henry Dodwell, Jr., eldest son of Henry, was an infidel, and published 
in 1742 Christianity not Founded on Argument. — William Dodwell, 1709-1785, 
younger son of Henry, Sr., wrote Rational Faith, in reply to his brother Henry's essay. 
He wrote also Free Answer to Middleton; Tncjuiry into the Miraculous Powers of the 
Primitive Church; The Sick Man's Companion ; Practical Discourses, etc. 

Patrick Delany, 1686-17^8, a native of Ireland and a Fellow of Trinity College, Dub- 
lin, was an intimate friend of Swift's. Delany wrote: Revelation Examined with 
Candor; Reflections on Polygamy; The Life and Reign of David; The Tribune, a 
periodical paper like The Spectator, etc., and running through tAventy numbers ; Stric- 
tures on Lord Orrery's Remarks on Swift, etc. 



Doddridge. 

Philip Doddridge, 1702-1751, was a Dissenting minister 
of great repute among all branches of the Protestant Church. 

Careei'. — Doddridge was the twentieth child of a London merchant, 
and lost both parents while he was still young. His first religious in- 
struction was given by his mother, who told him the Bible stories 
which were represented on the figured Dutch tiles in the chimney of 
his apartment. He was aided in obtaining his education by Dr. Sam- 
uel Clarke. He commenced preaching in his twentieth year to a small 
country congregation, where he remained several years, leading a re- 
tired and studious life, and laying up those treasures of useful learning 
which he afterwards poured forth in such profusion. He had at one 
time an academy for training young men for the ministry, and several 
very eminent dissenting ministers received their theological training 
from him. He was exceedingly methodical in all his arrangements 
and habits of life, and especially in the distribution and employment 
of his time. One of his habits was to rise invariably at five, at all 
seasons of the year. It was this method and economy in the use of 
his resources that enabled him to accomplish so much more than many 
who have had far greater and more brilliant abilities. 

Wo7'7es. — Doddridge's collected Works fill 10 vols., 8vo, besides 4 vols, of Sermons 
published posthumously, and 5 vols, of Life and Correspondence, — in all, 19 vols. The 
works best known are: The Family Expositor, which occupies 6 vols, in the collected 
edition here mentioned, and The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul. The 
Family Expositor has been extremely popular, and it is still used to some extent. The 
author seems to have had an instinctive sagacity in knowing just what was needed in 
such a work, to fit it for family use. The Rise and Progi-ess has long since become a 
classic in the list of books on religious experience. Doddridge wrote also some very 
excellent Hymns, which have found their way into the hymnals of most Protestant 
churches. His Evidences of Christianity is used as a text-book at Cambridge, England. 
22* R 



258 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPOEAEIES. 

William Cave, D. D., 1637-1713, was "an excellent and universal scholar, an elegant 
•writer, and a very eloquent preacher. His works are compiled with extensive knowl- 
edge of his subject, and great industry." — Darling. The following are his principal 
publications: The Lives of the Apostles; Lives of the Most Eminent Fathers in the 
first Four Centuries ; Primitive Christianity ; A Dissertation concerning the Govern- 
ment of the Ancient Church by Bishops; Historia Literaria, a work in Latin, giving 
an account of ecclesiastical writers from the Christian era to the fourteenth century. 



Leland. 

John Leland, D.D., 1691-1766, a Presbyterian minister, settled in 
Dublin, is distinguished as a writer of apologetics. 

Some of his works in defence of Christianity are considered as among the best that 
have ever been written. The following are the chief: A Defence of Christianity, 2 
vols , 8vo, in answer to Tindal ; The Divine Authority of the Old and New Testament 
asserted, 2 vols., 4to, in answer to Morgan : Remarks on " Christianity not Founded on 
Argument," 2 vols., 8vo, in answer to Dodwell; Remarks on Bolingbroke"s Letters on 
the Study and Use of History; A View of the Deistical Writers, 3 vols., 8vo; The Ad- 
vantage and Necessity of the Christian Revelation, 2 vols., 4to, etc. Lelaud's View of 
the Deistical Writers is specially celebrated. 

Rev. Simon Browne, 1680-1732, a Dissenting minister, and a popular preacher and 
writer, became insane on one particular subject, though in full possession of his 
faculties on all other subjects. He believed that God had "annihilated in him the 
thinking substance, and divested him of consciousness; that, though he retained the 
human form, and the faculty of speaking, in a manner that appeared to others rational, 
he had all the while no more notion of what he said than a parrot." He continued in 
this delusion for the rest of his life, and on the strength of it gave up his ministerial 
charge, though while in this condition he produced some of his ablest works, among 
others his Reply to Wollaston's Discourse on the Miracles of our Saviour, and Strictures 
on Tindal's Christianity as old as the Creation. He compiled also a Greek and Latin 
Dictionary. This work he regarded as no evidence of his having a soul : *' I am doing 
nothing that requires a reasonable soul; I am making a Dictionary; but you know 
thanks should be retiu-ned to God for everything, and therefore for Dictionary 
makers." Among his other works are: A Disquisition on the Trinity; The True 
Character of the Real Christian ; Hymns and Spiritual Songs, etc. 

Henry Grove, 1683-1738, was a Dissenting minister. ITe contributed four numbers to 
The Spectator. His works, chiefly theological, fill 12 vols. Among the subjects treated 
are Prayer, The Lord's Supper, Faith, A Future State, and a System of Moral Philoso- 
phy. "He resembles Watts, but is more nervous. His sermons are written with ele- 
gance of diction rarely to be met with. He has many judicious and new thoughts, dis- 
Ijosed in a method quite peculiar, and expressed with force and elegance. Every par- 
agraph he wrote is worthy of attentive perusal." — Doddridge. 

Thomas Haltburton, 1074-1712, a distinguished divine of the Church of Scotland, 
was born near Perth. He was Professor of Divinity in the University of St. Andrew's. 
He published Natural Religion Insufficient ; The Great Concern of Salvation, still in 
current demand ; and Sermons on various subjects. 

Thomas Delatjne, 1667-1728, a Dissenting clergyman, wrote A Plea for the Non-con- 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 259 

formists, which his opponents answered by having him put in the pillory, having his 
ears cut off, fining him, and casting him in prison, where he died. 

Benjamin Bennet, 1674^1726, was an eminent Non-conformist divine, some of whose 
works produced a marked effect. They were chit-fly theological. A Memorial of the 
Eeformation, and a Defence of the same ; Irenicum, a work on the Trinity ; Christian 
Oratory, or Devotions of the Closet ; The Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures. 

Thomas Ridgley, D. D., 1667-1734, an Independent Calviuistic divine, is chiefly 
known by his work, A Body of Divinity, being the substance of a course of lectures 
on The Assembly's Larger Catechism. This work, published originally in 1733, in 2 
vols., folio, and now in 4 vols., 8vo, is still in current use, and is a standard work on the- 
ology among Presbyterians, and indeed among ail Calvinists. 

Daniel Neal, 1678-1743, a Dissenting minister, educated partly at Rowe's Academy, 
and partly in Holland, wrote many works, but is known almost exclusively by one, 
The History of the Puritans, 4 vols., 8vo. This is the story of the Non-conformists, as 
seen and told by themselves; and it is usually applauded or condemned, according as 
the judge is a dissenter, or a member of the Church of England. There is no question, 
however, of its being a work of ability" and research. " Heylin, in his History of the 
Presbyterians, blackens them as so many political devils; and Neal, in his History 
of the Puritans, blanches them into a sweet and almond whiteness." — D' Israeli. 

Boston. 

Eev. Thomas Boston, 1676-1732, was a Scotch preacher of great 
note, whose Fourfold State used to be one of the household treasures 
in almost every religious family. 

Boston's complete works were printed in London in 1852, in 12 vols., 8vo. The fol- 
lowing are the ones best known: The Doctrines of the Christian Religion, comprising 
a complete body of divinity, and filling 3 vols.; The Crook in the Lot; and Human 
Nature in its Fourfold State, of primitive integrity, entire depravation, begun recov- 
ery, and consummate happiness or misery. " If another celebrated treatise is styled 
The Whole Duty of Man, I would call this The Whole of Man, as it comprises what he 
xvas originally, what he is by transgression, what he should be through grace, and what 
he will he in glory." — Hervey. 

John Abernethy, 1680-1740, of Ireland, noted as a Presbyterian divine, wrote Ser- 
mons on the Being and Perfections of God, and Posthumous Sermons (4 vols.). The 
former of these was famous in its day, and went through many editions. 

Geoege Benson, D. D., 1699-1763, an English dissenter, educated at Glasgow, was 
the author of numerous works. He was educated a Calvinist, but e?.rly went over 
towards Arianism. "His works are held in high reputation for learning and accu- 
racy." — Darling. They are: A Paraphrase and Notes on Six Epistles of Paul, 2 
vols., 4to; The History of the First Planting of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., 4to; 
The Reasonableness of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., 8vo ; The History of the Life 
of Jesus Christ, 4to. 

Samuel Chandler, D. D., 1693-1756, was a Dissenting minister, who in connection 
with his preaching kept a book-store, and did a good deal in the way of authorship. A 
Vindication of the Christian Religion ; Plain Reasons lor being a Christian ; Para- 



260 POPE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

phrase and Commentary on Joel ; Paraphrase and Notes on Galatians, Ephesians, and 
Thessalonians ; A Vindication of the History of the 0. Testament ; A Critical History 
of the Life of David; Sermons, etc. "He possessed great learning, very strong sense, 
inflexible resolution, aud was a zealous advocate of revelation/' — Dr. E. Wuliams. 

James Foster, D. D., 1697-1753, was a Dissenting minister in London, whose pulpit 
eloquence attracted great crowds of hearers. He began, in 1728, a series of Sunday 
Evening Lectures, which were continued for twenty years, and which were thronged 
by people of all ranks, — by those of all religions and of no religion. "Here w;is a 
confluence of persons of every rank, station, and quality — wits, free-thinkers, nnni- 
bers of clergy ; who, whilst they gratified their curiosity, had their professions shaken 
and their prejudices loosened." — Dr. Fleming. 

" Let modest Foster, if he will, excel 
Ten Metropolitans in preaching well." — Fope. 

Foster's principal publications are the following : Discourses on Natural Religion 
and Social Virtues, 2 vols., 4to ; Sermons, 4 vols., 8vo ; Essay on Fundamentals ; Defence 
of the Christian Religion, written against Tiudal. 

John Shute Barrington, 1678-1734, in the earlier part of his career engaged in 
politics, and became Lord Yiscouut of Ireland. At the age of forty-five he retired 
from political life, and devoted himself to theological research. He published a w^ork 
in two vols.. Miscellanea Sacra, which was considered as of high value. 

Richard Claridge, 1649-1723, was an eminent writer among the Society of Friends. 
He was educated for the Church of England and took orders in that church, lie after- 
wards became a Baptist, and finally a Friend. Some of his works are in Latin. His 
chief English writings are : Answers to Richard Allen ; Mercy Covering the Judgment 
Seat ; The Novelty and Nullity of Dissatisfaction ; Gospel Light, etc. 

Charles Done, 1745, a Catholic priest, wrote The Church History of England, 

3 vols., folio, intended as a reply to Burnet. The author is said to have spent thirty 
years in its compilation. A new edition, 14 vols., 8vo, was begun in 1839. 

Thomas Chubb, 1679-1746, a Unitarian writer of some notoriety, wrote the following 
works: The Supremacy of the Father Asserted ; The Previous Question with regard 
to religion ; A Discourse Concerning Reason with regard to Religion and Divine Reve- 
lation ; Tracts, etc. 

Thomas Evelyn, 1663-1743, a learned divine, wrote much in advocacy of Arianism, 
and was prosecuted and imprisoned for it. His chief work was An Inquiry into the 
Scripture Account of Jesus Christ. His Works, with a Memoir, have been published 
in 3 vols., 8vo. He believed Jesus to be the first of created beings, the Creator of the 
world, and an object of worship, but not strictly divine or equal to the Father. 

John Taylor, D. D., 1694-1761, was a learned Unitarian clergyman, for along time 
at the head of an Academy at Warrington, Lancashire. His works elicited replies from 
John Wesley, Jonathan Edwards, and others of equal note. Taylor wrote the follow- 
ing works: The Scriptural Doctrines of Original Sin proposed to Free and Candid Ex- 
amination; The Scripture Doctrine of Atonement Examined: A Scheme of Scripture 
Divinity ; A Paraphrase and Notes on the Epistle to the Romans. 




CHAPTER XII. 

Dr. Johnson and His Contemporaries. 

After the death of Pope, 1744, the person who for the 
next forty years figured most largely in literature was Dr. 
Samuel Johnson. The time of Johnson's supremacy covers, 
in round numbers, the first twenty-five years of the reign 
of George III., 1760-1785. It includes among its political 
events the celebrated trial of Warren Hastings, and the 
still more important issue, the American Revolutionary 
War. 

The writers who belong to this period are divided into 
four sections : 1. Miscellaneous Prose Writers, beginning 
with Dr. Johnson; 2. Novelists, beginning with Richard- 
son ; 3. Poets, beginning with Goldsmith ; 4. Theological 
Writers, beginning with Warburton. 

I. MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 

Dr. Johnson. 

Samuel Johnson, LL. D., 1709-1784, was for nearly an 
entire generation the acknowledged autocrat of English let- 
ters. He was the centre of attraction for such men as 
Goldsmith, Burke, Fox, Sheridan, Garrick, Reynolds, and 
Gibbon ; his presence and conversation were everywhere 
courted as though he had been the great Mogul of literary 
opinion. 

261 



262 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Early Career. — Dr. Johnson was born at Lichfield, the son of a 
bookseller. He was afflicted from boyhood with scrofula, which weak- 
ened his eyesight and otherwise indisposed him to bodily exertion. 
Notwithstanding these obstacles, he was, on his admission to the Uni- 
versity, uncommonly well versed in the preparatory studies. After re- 
maining three years at Oxford, he left for want of means to continue 
his residence, and did not take his degree. He taught for a short time 
as usher in an academy, but found the duties irksome and gave up the 
position. He then formed an engagement in Birmingham to write for 
a paper. His first book, a translation from the French, brought him 
the sum of five guineas. 

Marriage. — At the age of twenty-seven he was married to a widow 
nearly twice his age, with vulgar manners, a loud voice, and a florid com- 
plexion. They seem, however, to have lived happily together, and on 
her death, sixteen years afterwards, he mourned her loss to a degree 
that for some years unfitted him for literary labor. She brought him 
a fortune of £800, and with this he attempted to set up an Academy." 
He obtained, however, only three pupils, one of them the celebrated 
Garrick. The academy failing, Johnson determined to go to London 
and enter upon a life of authorship. Garrick went with him to seek 
fame and fortune as an actor. 

Hardships in London. — The first few years of Johnson's life in Lon- 
don were miserable enough. He often suffered from actual hunger, 
and at times he and the poet Savage walked the streets together at night, 
because too poor to pay for lodgings. The first work of his which 
brought him into note was London, a Satire, in imitation of Juvenal. 
There were in this short piece a vigor of thought and a polish of ex- 
pression, that marked the author as a man of no common order. Pope, 
then in his meridian, recognized at once the unknown author as a 
dangerous competitor, yet had the generosity to help to bring him into 
notice and favor. 

Better Times. — Johnson's fortunes after this gradually improved. 
He found employment for his pen in a variety of literary enterprises, 
so that he was no longer in actual want, and in 1762, at the age of fifty- 
three, he received from King George III. the grant of an annual pen- 
sion of £300. His last days were spent in comparative ease and com- 
fort. He became the centre of a circle of men rarely equalled for 
brilliancy and genius ; he was honored with titles from the Universi- 
ties ; his voice was everywhere listened to as that of the greatest liter- 
ary magnate of the realm. 



MISCELLANEOUS PKOSE WRITERS. 263 

WorTis. — llis principal works are the following: London, a Satire, already men- 
tioned ; The Vanity of Human Wishes, his only other poem of note or value; Irene, a 
Tragedy, generally admitted to be a failure; Rasselas, or The Happy Valley, a story 
with little incident, but embellished with a sonorous and flowing eloquence ; The 
Rambler, of which he wrote 204 out of the 208 numbers; The Idler, another series 
of essays of a like character ; A Life of Savage, the poet : The Lives of the Poets, filling 
many volumes ; A Journey to the Hebrides ; A volume of Political Essays, originally 
published as pamphlets; An Edition of Shakespeare, with Preface and Notes; and 
lastly, A Dictionary of the English Language. 

Merits as a Lexicographer, — Johnson was not a linguist ; he knew 
nothing of the science of language, and next to nothing of the require- 
ments of lexicography, as now understood. Yet, in the preparation 
of his English Dictionary, he achieved a great and lasting work, the 
most important single contribution to English letters of the age in 
which he lived. The collection of examples which he made from his 
own reading and research, in illustration of the meaning of the words, 
and the surpassing clearness with which in most cases he expressed 
the meaning in his definitions, have won the admiration of all compe- 
tent judges, and have made his work the basis of all subsequent efforts 
in the same line. 

Character as an Essayist. — As an Essayist, Johnson lacks the grace 
and simplicity and exquisite humor which were the peculiar charm 
of Addison ; yet he was a fearless advocate of morals and religion, 
when it was the fashion among men of wit to decry them both ; and 
he undoubtedly, by his courage in this matter, and by the masculine 
force of his understanding, gave a tone to the public mind on this sub- 
ject, the effects of which have been felt ever since. 

Critical Judgments. — Johnson was a man of violent prejudices, an 
ultra Tory in politics, and, as sucli, opposed to republicanism in every 
shape. He was not only bitter against the Americans, but he did scant 
justice to Milton, as the poet of the Commonwealth. His judgments, 
indeed, in matters of poetry, are the least valuable of his opinions. He 
could appreciate didactic or satiric poetry, like his own, or like that of 
Dryden, but he would have been as incompetent to feel the finer beau- 
ties of Tennyson, as he was to feel those of Shakespeare. His edition of 
Shakespeare, indeed, except portions of the Preface, was an utter failure. 
His Lives of the Poets, however, contains some of the best things he 
has written, and the work, with all its acknowledged shortcomings, is 
a valuable part of the permanent literature of the language. 

Boswell's Life of Johnson. — In enumerating tlie works of Johnson, 
Boswell's Biography of him should always be included. That biogra- 



264 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPOE ARIES . 

phy consists mainly of the sayings of Johnson, as recorded by Bos well 
from day to day, and these sayings are probably a better exponent of 
Johnson's mind than any of his own writings. When he put pen to 
paper, his mind was at once on stilts, and he gave utterance to his 
thoughts according to the false ideas of style which he had formed. 
But in his table-talk; he was idiomatic and simple, and his thoughts 
came with a directness that added to their native force, 

" Nobody now reads The Rambler or The Idler, and the colossal reputation of John- 
son rests almost entirely upon his profound and caustic sayings recorded in Boswell."' 
— Sir Arcliibald Alison. 

"All his books are written in a learned language; in a language which nobody 
hears from his mother or his nurse; in a language in which nobody ever quarrels, or 
drives bargains, or makes love ; in a language in whicli nobody ever thinks. Manner- 
ism is pardonable, and is sometimes even agreeable, when the manner, though vicious, 
is natural. Few readers, for example, would be willing to part with the mannerism 
of Milton or Burke. But a mannerism which does not sit easy on the mannerist — 
-which has been adopted on principle, and which can be sustained only by constant 
eflFort,^is always offensive, and such is tlie manneiism of Johnson." — Macaulay. 

" In massive force of understanding, multifarious knowledge, sagacity, and moral 
intrepidity, no writer of the eighteenth century surpassed Dr. Samuel Johnson. His 
various works, with their sententious morality and high-sounding sonorous periods — 
his manly character and appearance — his great virtues and strong prejudices — his 
early and severe struggles — his love of argument and society, into which he poured 
the treasures of a rich and full mind — his wit, repartee, and brow-beating — his 
rough manners and kind heart — his curious liousehold, in which were congregated 
the lame, the blind, and the despised — his very looks, gesticulations, and dress — have 
all been brought so vividly before us by his biographer, Boswell, that to readers of 
every class Johnson is as well known as a member of their own family. 

" In literature his influence has been scarcely less extensive. No prose writer of that 
day escaped the contagion of his peculiar style. He banished for a long period the 
naked simplicity of Swift, and the idiomatic graces of Addison ; he depressed the lit- 
erature and poetry of imagination, while he elevated that of the understanding; he 
based criticism on strong sense and solid judgment, not on scholastic subtleties and 
refinemint ; and though some of the higher qualities and attributes of genius eluded 
his grasp and observation, the withering scorn and invective with which he assailed 
all affected sentimentalism, immorality, and licentiousness, introduced a pure and 
healthful and invigorating atmosphere into the crowded walks of literature. These 
are solid and substantial benefits which should weigh down errors of taste or the ca- 
prices of a temperament constitutionally prone to melancholy and ill health, and 
which was little sweetened by prosperity or applause at that period of life when the 
habits are formed and the manners become permanent." — Chambers. 

"Johnson's work, as everybody knows, is conducted on the most capricious and ir- 
regular plan. Besides these defects of plan, the critic was certainly deficient in sen- 
sibility to the more delicate, the minor beauties of poetic sentiment. He analyzes 
verse in the cold-blooded spirit of a chemist, until all the aroma which constituted 
its principal charm escapes in the decomposition. By this kind of process, some of 
the finest fancies of tbe Muse, the lofty ditbyrambics of Gray, the ethereal effusions 
pf Collins, and of Milton, too, are rendered sufficiently vapid." — Frescott. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 265 

" It has been asked, with emphasis, ' Who reads The Rambler? ' and it is indubitable 
that this book, which once exerted so mighty an influence on the English language 
and people, has given place, at least in general reading, to works of far inferior merit 
and interest. The reason seems to be that its object is well-nigli accomplished. It 
commenced with a standard of morals and language elevated far above the prevailing 
style uf morals and of writing. It has elevated both, and has brought the English 
language and the English notions of morality to its own level. Nor is it wonderful 
that men should regard with less interest a work which now is seen to have no very 
extraoi'dinary elevation. It is a component part of English literature, having fixed 
itself in the language, the style, and the morals of the English people, and taken its 
place as an integral, almost undistinguished, part of the national principles of writ- 
ing and morality. The result is that, while the benefits of The Rambler may be dif- 
fusing themselves, unperceived, to almost all the endearments of the fireside aud the 
virtues of the community, the book itself may be very imperfectly known and unfre- 
quently perused. Johnson may be almost forgotten, except in praise ; but his mighty 
power is yet sending forth a mild infiuence over lauds and seas, like the gentle move- 
ments of the dew and the sunbeam." — Rev. Albert Barnes. 

James Boswell, 1740-1795, a Scotch lawyer and writer, 
is known almost exclusively by his Life of Dr. Johnson, 
already referred to. 

Boswell was on intimate terms with Johnson, and wrote down from 
day to day what that great man said. Tliese off-hand utterances of 
Johnson are more remarkable, more stamped with genius, more thor- 
oughly Johnsonian, than even Johnson's own writings. They consti- 
tute really a part, and the best part, of his works. 

" Boswell's Life of Johnson is one of the best works in the world. It is assuredly 
a great, a very great work. Homer is not more decidedly the first of heroic Poets, 
Shakespeare is not more decidedly the first of Dramatists, Demosthenes is not more 
decidedly the first of Orators, than Boswell is the first of Biographers. He has dis- 
tanced all his competitors so decidedly that it is not worth while to place them: 
Eclipse is first, and the rest nowhere. We are not sure that there is in the whole his- 
tory of the human intellect so singular a phenomenon as this book. Manj- of the 
greatest men that ever lived have written biography; Boswell was one of the smallest 
men that ever lived, and he has beaten them all." — Macaulay. 

Burke. 

Edmund Burke, 1728-1797, was a man of commanding 
abilities, and one of the leading writers and statesmen of 
his age. He was a native of Dublin, and a graduate of 
Trinity College of that city. 

First Work. — Burke's first publication of any note was The Vindi- 
cation of Natural Society, by a Late Noble Writer. It Avas written in 
imitation of Bolingbroke, and published anonymously. " The ot^ect 
23 



266 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

was to expose his Lordship's mode of reasoning, by running it out into 
its legitimate consequences. He therefore applied it to civil society. 
He undertook, in the person of Bolingbroke, to expose the crimes and 
wretchedness which have prevailed under every form of government, 
and thus to show that society is itself an evil, and the savage state the 
only one favorable to virtue and happiness. It was the most perfect 
specimen the world has ever seen of the art of imitating the style and 
manner of another. He went beyond the mere choice of words, the 
structure of sentence^, and the cast of imagery, into the deepest re- 
cesses of thought ; and so completely had he imbued himself with the 
spirit of Bolingbroke, that he brought out precisely what every one 
sees his lordship ought to have said on his own principles, and might 
be expected to say, if he had dared to express his sentiments." The 
effect was the more remarkable, because in the opinion of all the emi- 
nent critics of that day, both friends and foes, Bolingbroke's style was 
"not only the best of that day, but in itself wholly inimitable." Yet 
the critics were completely taken in. The essay was accepted almost 
universally as a posthumous work of Bolingbroke's. Johnson, Chester- 
field, and even Warburton pronounced it genuine. " You see, sir, the 
fellow's [Bolingbroke's] principles ; they come out now in full blaze." 
— Johnson. 

Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful. — In the course of the same year 
(1756, eet. 28), Burke published his celebrated work, A Philosophical 
Inquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, 
which has become an acknowledged English classic, as much so as any 
writing of Aristotle is classical in Greek. The publication of this work 
brought the author at once into public notice, and led to the acquaint- 
ance and friendship of Johnson. Reynolds, and other celebrities. 

The Annual Register. — Dodsley's Annual Eegister, which was begun 
in 1758, owed its origin to a suggestion of Burke's, and most of the 
matter in the early volumes was prepared by him. An Account of 
the European Settlements in America, which appeared about the same 
time, is also ascribed to Burke. 

Political Career, — In 1766, Burke entered Parliament, and for the 
next twenty years his pen and his tongue were occupied mainly with 
affairs of state. The most beautiful and eloquent of all his produc- 
tions was called out by the excesses and the frenzy of the French re- 
publicans, after the overthrow of the monarchy. His own party was 
in sympathy with the revolutionists in France. But Burke became 
alarmed at the lengths to which they were going, and in 1790 he gave 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 267 

utterance to his feelings in the work just referred to, Reflections on the 
Revolution in France. On no one of his works did he bestow such care. 
While going through the press, more than a dozen proofs were made 
before liis critical taste was satisfied. The efiect of the publication was 
prodigious, not only in England, but throughout Europe ; and honors 
and emoluments were showered upon the author from every quarter. 

Impeachment of Warren Hastings. — The greatest work of Burke's pub- 
lic life was his Impeachment of Warren Hastings, Unfortunately, his 
speech on this occasion was not written out by the author. The tradi- 
tions of it that remain, however, leave little doubt that it was one of the 
greatest efforts of parliamentary eloquence in ancient or modern times. 

Burke was offered a peerage. Having just lost his only surviving son, 
he declined the barren honor ; and in A Letter to a Noble Lord, writ- 
ten soon after, he gives expression to his feeling of loneliness and be- 
reavement in terms of singular beauty and pathos, Burke's Parlia- 
mentary Sj)eeches fill several volumes, and form an enduring monu- 
ment to his fame as a great philosophical statesman, while his essay 
on The Sublime and Beautiful, and his Reflections on the Revolution 
in France, challenge to themselves a foremost place among the great 
English classics. 

" No one can doubt that enlightened men in all ages will hang over the Works of 
Mr. Burke. He was a writer of the first class, and excelled in almost every kind of 
prose composition. The extraordinary depth of his detached views, the penetrating 
sagacity which he occasionally applies to the affairs of men and their motives, and 
the curious felicity of expression with which he unfolds principles, and traces resem- 
blances and relations, are separately the gift of few, and, in their union, probably with- 
out any example. When he is handling anyone matter, we perceive that we are con- 
versing with a reasoner and a teacher to whom almost every other branch of knowl- 
edge is familiar. His views range over all the cognate subjects; his reasonings are 
derived from principles applicable to other matters as well as the one in hand ; argu- 
ments pour in from all sides, as well as those which start up under our feet, the nat- 
ural growth of the path he is leadiug us over; wiile, to throw light round our steps, 
and either explore its darker places or serve for our recreation, illustrations are 
fetched from a thousand quarters ; and an imagination marvellously quick to descry 
unthought-of resemblances, pours forth the stores, which a lore yet more marvellous 
has gathered fmai all ages and nations and arts and tongues. We are, in respect of 
the argument, reminded of Bacon's multifarious knowledge, and the exuberance of 
his learned fancy; while the many-lettered diction recalls to mind the first of Eng- 
lish poets and his immortal verse, rich with the spoils of all sciences and all times. 

"All his works, indeed, even his controversial, are so informed with general reflec- 
tion, so variegated with speculative discussion, that they wear the air of the Lyceum 
as well as the Academy. His narrative is excellent; and it is impossible more har- 
moniously to expose the details of a complicated subject, to give them more animation 
and interest, if dry in themselves, or to make them bear by the mere power of state- 
ment more powerfully upon the argument. In description he can hardly be surpassed, 
at least for effect ; he has all the qualities that conduce to it, — ardor of purpose, some- 



268 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

times rising into violence, — vivid, but too liixnriant fancy, — bold, frequently extrav- 
agant, conception, — tlie faculty of shedding upon mere inanimate scenery the light 
imparted by moral associations. 

*' He now moves on with the composed air, the even, dignified pace of the historian ; 
and unfolds his facts in a narrative so easy, and yet so correct, that you jjlainly per- 
ceive he wanted only the dismissal of other pursuits to have rivalled Jiivy or Hiune. 
But soon this advance is interrupted, and he stops to display his powers of description, 
■when the boldness of his design is only matched by the brilliancy of his coloring. He 
then skirmishes, for a space, and puts in motion all the lighter anus of wit; some- 
times not unmingled with drollery, sometimes bordering upon farce. His main bat- 
tery is now opened, and a tempest bursts forth of every weapon of attack — invective, 
abuse, irony, sarcasm, simile drawn out to allegory, allusion, quotation, fable, para- 
ble, anathema." — Lord Brougham. 

Fox. 

Kt. Hon. Charles James Fox, 1749-1806, was probably 
the most brilliant parliamentary debater that England has 
ever produced. 

Fox was of honorable birth, being second son to Lord Holland. He 
Tvas educated at Eton and Oxford, and in both places distinguished 
himself by the accuracy of his classical scholarship. He also became 
proficient in modern languages, and at different times visited the con- 
tinent, where he acquired the love for gaming, which was the greatest 
blot upon his life. He entered Parliament at the age of twenty, and 
devoted himself exclusively to the cultivation of parliamentary elo- 
quence. " I knew him when he was nineteen ; since which time he 
has risen by slow degrees to be the most brilliant and accomplished 
debater the Avorld ever saw." — Burke. 

Fox was at first a supporter of the Tory party, but afterwards went 
over to the Whigs, and became finally their acknowleaged leader. He 
advocated the American cause in the House of Commons. He was 
associated with Burke in the impeachment of Warren Hastings, The 
warm friendship between Burke and Fox was interrupted by the 
French Revolution, Burke being frightened by its excesses, while Fox 
palliated and defended them. On the ascendency of Pitt and the war 
against France, Fox was steadfastly in the opposition. 

Woi'Jcs. — Fox's Speeches have been published, in 6 vols., 8vo. He also began A 
History of the Reign of James II. 

" The most accomplished debater that ever appeared on the theatre of public affairs." 
— Brougham. 

" He certainly possessed, above all moderns, that union of reason, simplicity, and 
vehemence which formed the prince of orators. He was the most Demosthenean 
speaker since Demosthenes." — Mackintosh. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WEITERS. 269 

LoED Chesterfield. — Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl 
of Chesterfield, 1694-1773, "the philosopher of flattery and 
dissimulation," occupied a conspicuous position in society 
and in affairs of state, and was ambitious of equal distinc- 
tion in the world of letters. 

" He was at the head of the ton, in days when in order to be at the head 
of the ton it was not sufficient to be dull and supercilious." — Macaulay. 
Chesterfield was intimate with Pope, Swift, Voltaire, Montesquieu, etc. 
Seeking to play the patron to Dr. Jolinson, the latter addressed to him. 
that celebrated and rather churlish letter which is so often quoted. 
Chesterfield's Speeches in Parliament were often of a high order of 
eloquence. His claim to a permanent place in literature, however, 
rests almost entirely upon his Letters to his Son. These are graceful 
and elegant compositions, but are noted for the worldly, selfish, and 
even at times immoral character of the advice given. " Their publi- 
cation is much to be regretted by every friend of this accomplished, 
witty, and eloquent peer." — Chambers. 

Junius — Sir Philip Francis. 

Sir Philip Francis, 1740-1818, was an accomplished po- 
litical writer, contemporary with Burke, Fox, and Pitt. 

Sir Philip took an active part in the famous trial of Warren Hastings, 
and was conspicuous as a statesman and a member of Parliament. The 
conjecture that he was the author of the Letters of Junius, was early 
broached, and after much discussion was nearly abandoned, notwith- 
standing the advocacy of such men as Macaulay and Brougham, until 
the year 1871, when the authorship of the Letters was put almost 
beyond question by the examination of the handwriting of Junius 
and of Sir Philip Francis by a professional expert. 

Letters of Junius. — The Letters of Junius appeared at intervals in 
the Public Advertiser, of London, during the years 1769-72. By the 
boldness of their invective and the masterly style in which they were 
written, they attracted universal attention, and they exerted a prodi- 
gious influence upon the public mind. That influence was intensified 
by the impenetrable secrecy in which the authorship was shrouded. 
The writer was evidently well acquainted with important state secrets ; 
he was one whose abilities were of the first order, and who could not 
well live in obscurity ; yet of all the men eminent in letters and posi- 
tion, then living, there was not one whom it seemed possible to asso- 
23* 



270 DE. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTE MPOR AEIES . 

ciate with the authorship of these Letters. Conjectures pointed to one 
after another, but some fatal mark was found that seemed to exclude 
each in succession, until the hunt was almost given up in despair. The 
public mind had well-nigh settled down in the conclusion that the 
mystery was insoluble. At length, in 1871, a volume appeared, entitled 
The Handwriting of Junius Professionally Investigated, by Mr. Charles 
Chabot, an Expert, which seems to settle the question. Its object is to 
prove by a minute and exhaustive examination of the Junian manu- 
scripts and of the letters of Sir Philip Francis, that both were written 
by the same hand. The proof is of the strongest kind, amounting 
almost to a demonstration, and wUl go far to put this vexed question 
at rest. 

As specimens of style, the Letters of Junius are, in their kind, 
absolutely perfect. 

"The classic purity of their language, the exquisite force and perspicuity of their 
argument, the keen severity of their reproach, the extensive information they evince, 
their fearless and decisive tone, and above all, their stern and steady attachment to 
the purest principles of the Constitution, acquired for them, with an almost electric 
speed, a popularity which no series of letters have since possessed, nor, perhaps, ever 
v;ill; and, what is of far greater consequence, diffused among the body of the people 
a clearer knowledge of their constitutional rights than they had ever before attained, 
and animated them with a more determined spirit to maintain them inviolate. En- 
veloped in the cloud of a fictitious name, the writer of these philippics, unseen him- 
self, beheld with secret satisfaction the vast influence of his labors, and enjoyed, 
though, as we shall afterwards observe, not always without apprehension, the universal 
hunt that was made to detect him in his disguise. He beheld the people extolling him, 
the Court execrating him, and ministers, and more than ministers, trembling beneath 
the lash of his invisible hand."— Jo/m 31ason Good. 

William Murray, Lord Mansfield, 1704-1793, is known 
as one of the most eminent and upright of English judges. , 

Lord Mansfield was a native of Perth. He was educated at Oxford ; 
rose to be Attorney-General, and finally Lord Chief-Justice of Eng- 
land. His reputation as an orator and statesman was second only to 
that of Pitt, but to the present generation he is known almost exclu- 
sively as one of the purest and most eminent judges that ever sat upon 
the English bench. All that is left to us of his labors is embodied in 
a Treatise on the Study of Law (the joint production of Mansfield, 
Ashburton, and Thurlow), and in the laAV reports of Cowper, Douglass, 
and Burrow, containing his decisions. Lord Mansfield may be said to 
be the author of the English Commercial Law. What, before his time, 
was a mass of crude beginnings and isolated cases, became, under him, an 
admirable system of sound principles. During the Junius controversy, 



MISCELLANEOUS PHOSE WRITERS. 271 

Lord Mansfield was the object of much popular dislike, on the suspi- 
cion of being opposed to the liberty of the press. 

Sir William Blackstone, 1723-1780, one of the most cele- 
brated of English jurists, is known everywhere by his Com- 
mentaries on the Laws of England. 

Blackstone's Commentaries is a standard text-book in the legal pro- 
fession throughout England and America. Though strictly profes- 
sional, it has given the author a place in letters, because of the excel- 
lence of its style. Indeed there is little doubt that much of the celeb- 
rity of Blackstone is due, not merely to his legal learning and acumen, 
but to the purity of his English and the clearness and elegance with 
which he expresses himself. " A good gentleman's law book, clear, 
but not deep." — Home Tooke. 

Et. Hon. William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, 1708-1778, " was the 
most powerful orator that ever illustrated and ruled the senate of this 
empire. For nearly half a century he was not merely the arbiter of 
the destinies of his own country, but the foremost man of all the world." 
— London Quarterly. 

Works. — Chatham took no pains to write out and publish his great speeches, and 
the reporting art did not then exi&t as it does now. The specimens of his oratory that 
survive, therefore, are meagre and unsatisfactory. We have, however. Letters to his 
Nephew, and the Chatham Papers, containing his official correspondence. 

Hume. 

David Hume, 1711-1766, is universally know^n as the 
author of the most popular History of England yet written, 
and as a writer of great power on subjects connected with 
political economy, morals, and religion. In the works last 
named he is a thorough-going infidel, attacking Christianity 
on metaphysical grounds chiefly. This class of his writings 
has been of most baleful tendency. 

Hume was a Scotchman, a native of Edinburgh. He abandoned 
business and the study of the law for literature ; was Secretary of the 
French Embassy, 1763-4; and Under-Secretary of State, 1767-8. His 
life was always uneventful, and, with the exception of the few years 
when he served in Government offices, was passed in studious retire- 
ment, chiefly in London. 



272 DR.JOHNSOX AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Publications. — In 1737 he published his Treatise of Human Na- 
ture ; in 1741, his Essays, Moral and Political ; in 1748, his Philo- 
sophical Essays on the Understanding ; in 1751, An Inquiry concerning 
the Principles of Morals; in 1752, Political Discourses; in 1755, Nat- 
ural History of Keligion. The History of England was published in 
the interval between 1754 and 1762. 

As a -writer alone, no one, perhaps, in England, has been made the object of more 
violent attack than Hume. Each of his writings has been alternately extolled and 
denounced. Inasmuch as they cover such debatable ground, and discuss their subjects 
■with the utmost freedom of opinion, it is only natural that they should find favor with 
no party in particular- 

merits as a Historian. — With regard to Hume's merit as a historian, it is not 
easy to arrive at any very decided opinion. His history has ever been, and will con- 
tinue to be, until superseded by a better, the most readable general work on the Eng- 
lish past. In one respect, at least, its merits are unquestionable — the pureness and 
grace of his style. Gibbon declares that he always closed one of Hume's volumes 
" with a mixed sensation of delight and despair." As an investigator into the facts 
and truths of history, on the other hand, Hume is undoubtedly weak and untrust- 
worthy—not merely because he wrote his work from the point of view of one politi- 
cal party (the Tory), or that he is guilty of many inaccuracies ; but because, as is evi- 
dent from the time spent in its composition, and from outside evidence as to Hume's 
mode of study and composition, the writer was superficial and careless. In this re- 
spect, Hume differs widely from his contemporary Gibbon, whose work was the result 
of protracted years of the most exhaustive study. Besides, the oflBcial publication, in 
the present century, of old records and state papers has thrown upon the world an 
immense mass of hitherto buried knowledge, which the English historian who would 
be true to his mission must carefully digest and assimilate, at the expense, perhaps, 
of a radical change of his views on many a fundamental point. For instance, Queen 
Elizabeth, as revealed in the light of contemporaneous documents, is anything but the 
" Good Queen Bess " of popular tradition. 

Influence of his Philosophical Opinions. — Hume's influence as a writer on 
morals and philosophy is even greater, perhaps, than that as a historian. His posi- 
tion, as before remarked, is that of a thorough-going infidel. His " Essay on Mira- 
cles," the most celebrated of all, is still, in one form or another, the battle-ground 
between believer and unbeliever. By reason of the vigor and grace of its stjde, it has 
always been the most formidable engine of attack upon Christianity. Hume was not 
merely a metaphysical thinker, however. His politico-economical essaj'S are master- 
pieces of clear thinking applied to practical subjects. They have been highly praised 
by subsequent leaders in the science, and may be considered as the forerunner, and in 
methodical arrangement the superior, of Adam Smith's celebrated dissertation. 

Gibbon. 

Edward Gibbon, 1737-1794, by his great work, The De- 
cline and Fall of the Roman Empire, created for himself 
a permanent place in literature. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 273 

Career. — Gibbon belonged to an ancient family in Kent. He studied 
first at the Westminster school, and then at Oxford, but his health was 
delicate, and his progress in knowledge was but little ; and .he left the 
University after a residence of fourteen months. Falling in with the 
writings of Bossuet and Parsons, he was convinced of the unsound- 
ness of Protestantism and became a Catholic. Partly for the benefit 
of his health, and partly to separate him from certain unfavorable in- 
fluences, his father placed him under the care of a Protestant minister 
at Lausanne, in Switzerland. After residing here for eighteen months, 
Gibbon abjured his new faith, and was received again into the com- 
munion of the Protestant Church. Pie continued to reside at Lau- 
sanne for several years, pursuing his studies. 

Love Affair. — Gibbon formed an attachment for a beautiful and ac- 
complished lady of Lausanne, Susan Curchod ; and the devotion of 
the young Englishman was understood to be acceptable to the lady. 
But his father interposed, and the matter was dropped. The lady 
afterwards became the wife of the celebrated Necker, and the mother of 
the equally celebrated Madame de Stael. Gibbon says that the wound 
was insensibly healed by time, but he never married. "Since the 
failure of my first wishes, I have never entertained any serious thoughts . 
of a matrimonial connection." 

Literary Ambition. — On returning to England, in 1758, after an 
absence of five years. Gibbon was dazzled and stimulated by the liter- 
ary fame of Addison, Swift, Hume, Eobertson, and others, and he 
formed the purpose of emulating in some way their illustrious exam- 
ple. He made several attempts at authorship, with only indifierent 
success. 

First Inception of his Great Work. — It was about six years later, 
in 1764, in his twenty-eighth year, while on a visit to the Eternal city, 
that the idea of his great work first flashed upon him. " It was at 
Eome, on the 15th of October, 1764, as I sat musing amidst the ruins 
of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars were singing vespers in the 
temple of Jupiter, that the idea of writing the decline and fall of the 
city first started to my mind." 

Publication. — The first volume of The Decline and Fall came out 
in 1776. Its success was immediate and great. " I am at a loss to de- 
scribe the success of the work, without betraying the vanity of the 
writer. The first impressions were exhausted in a few days ; a second 
and third edition were scarcely adequate to the demand ; and the book- 
seller's property was twice invaded by the pirates of Dublin. My book 
was upon every table, and almost on everv toilette ; the liistorian waa 

S 



274 DE. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPOE AEIES. 

crowned by the taste or fashion of the day." The second and third 
volumes appeared in 1781, after an interval of five years. The author 
then carried into effect a plan which he had long contemplated, and 
returned to Lausanne for his permanent residence. There, in cheerful 
seclusion, he wrote the remaining volumes of his history, and he thus 
commemorates the conclusion of his labors ; 

"It was on the day, or rather night, of the 27th of June, 1787, between the hours 
of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the last page in a bummer-house 
in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in a herceau, or covered 
walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, the mountains. 
The air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected 
from the waters, and all nature was silent. I will not dissemble the first emotions 
of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and, perhaps, the establishment of my fame. 
But my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind, 
by the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, 
and that, whatsoever might be the future fate of my history, the life of the historian 
must be short and precarious. I will add two facts, which have seldom occurred in 
the composition of six, or even five quartos. 1. My first rough manuscript, without 
any intermediate copy, has been sent to the press. 2. Not a sheet has been seen by 
any human eyes excepting those of the author and the printer ; the faults and the 
merits are exclusively my own." — Autobiography. 

Gibbon proceeded at once to England with his manuscripts and su- 
perintended the printing. The final publication took place on the 
anniversary of his fifty-first birthday. His profit on the sale of his 
work was £6000, that of his publisher was £60,000. 

In 1788 Gibbon returned to his seclusion at Lausanne, with the in- 
tention of ending his days there. But the commotion of the French 
Revolution produced a feeling of insecurity, and in 1793 he reluctantly 
bade the place a final adieu, and went back to England. 

Character of the Work. — The Decline and Fall is universally ac- 
knowledged to be one of the greatest masterpieces of historical compo- 
sition, — having the artistic finish of the classic models and the 
exhaustive learning and research of modern history. It is subject, 
however, to one great blot. The author's prejudices against Christian- 
ity warped his judgment whenever that subject was introduced. 

" Christianity alone receives no embellishment from the magic of Gibbon's language ; 
his imagination is dead to Its moral dignity ; it is kept down by a general tone of 
jealous disparagement, or neutralized by a painfully elaborate exposition of its darker 
and degenerate periods. There are occasions, indeed, when its pure and exalted 
humanity, when its manifestly beneficial influence, can compel even him, as it were, 
to fairness, and kindle his unguarded eloquence to its usual fervor ; but in general he 
soon relapses into a frigid apathy ; affects an ostentatiously severe impartiality; notes 
all the faults of Christians in every age with bitter and almost malignant sarcasm ; 
reluctantly, and with exception and reservation, admits their claim to admiration — 
the glories of Christianity, in short, touch no chord in the heart of the writer ; his 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 275 

imagination remains unkindled ; his words, though they maintain their stately and 
measured march, have become cool, argumentative, and inanimate." — Milman. 

In the mere matter of style, Gibbon is obviously open to the criti- 
cism of being wanting in simplicity. If not too ornate and elaborate, 
the ornament and elaboration are at least too apparent. 

" He will not condescend to be plain ; he forgets that the very business of the his- 
torian is to relate the history of events as they happened. He must always shine ; 
but, laboring for effect, he wholly omits the obvious consideration that relief is abso- 
lutely necessary to produce it; and forgets that a strong, unbroken light may dazzle 
without pleasing, or may shine rather tlian illuminate, and that a broad glare may be 
as confused and uninteresting as darkness itself. The main fault of his style is the 
perpetual effort which it discloses. Hume may have concealed his art bettor than 
Robertson, yet the latter is ever at his entire ease, while Gibbon is ever in the atti- 
tudes of the Academy : he is almost agonistic. He can tell you nothing in plain terms, 
unadorned with figure, unseasoned with epigram and point." — Brougham. 

Gibbon wrote some other works besides The Decline and Fall, but 
the only one of them of any note was his Autobiography, written to 
amuse his leisure hours after his great work was oiF his hands and 
he had become famous. It is considered one of the happiest efforts in 
that line of composition. 

"It is perhaps the best specimen of autobiography in the English language. De- 
scending from the lofty level of his history, and relaxing the stately march which he 
maintains throughout that work, into a more natural and easy pace, this enchanting 
writer, with an ease, a spirit, and a vigor peculiar to himself, conducts his readers 
through a sickly childhood, a neglected and desultory education, and a youth wasted 
in the unpromising and unscholarlike occupation of a militia oificer, to the period 
when he resolutely applied the energies of his genius to a severe course of voluntary 
study, which, in the space of a few years, rendered him a consummate master of 
Roman antiquity, and lastly produced the history of the decline and fall of the 
mighty empire." — London Quarterly Review. 

Robertson. 

William Kobertson, 1721-1793, is another of the great 
historians of this period, — Hume, Gibbon, and Robertson 
constituting an illustrious trio, whose names always go to- 
gether, although both their works and they themselves are 
quite unlike. 

Robertson's chief works were A History of Scotland, A 
History of America, and A History of Charles V. 

Career.— Eobertson, a native of Scotland, the son of a Scotch min- 
ister of straightened means, studied at the University of Edinburgh, and 
entered the ministry, where he soon distinguished himself by his pulpit 
eloquence. Soon after the appearance of his History of Scotland, he 



276 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

was chosen one of the Chaplains-in-ordinary to the King, and made 
Principal of the University of Edinburgh in 1763, which position he 
retained until his death. In 1764 Eobertson Avas appointed his Majes- 
ty's Historiographer for Scotland. 

Works. — Of Kobertson's merits as a preacher we have but little 
means of judging, as he published but one sermon, and that on a his- 
torical subject. The Situation of the World at Christ's Appearance. 
This short but able monograph still possesses decided value. In 1758 
appeared his first great work, A History of Scotland under Queen 
Mary and James VI. (I. of England). It established immediately the 
author's reputation as a historian. The History of Charles V. ap- 
peared in 1769, and .the History of America in 1777. Eobertson's 
last work, An Historical Disquisition Concerning the Knowledge which 
the Ancients had of India, based upon Major Kennell's Memoirs of a 
Map of Hindostan, has lost somewhat of its importance through the 
progress of discovery in the present century. 

Werits as a Historian. — There has been some conflict of opinion as to Robert- 
son's merits as a historian. His works were welcomed with almost unmixed applause. 
Scarcely Mas there a dissenting voice to be heard. Subse^iuent critics, however, have 
not been so unqualified in their praise ; and some, indeed, have been severe in their 
strictures. In fact, the only historians of the eighteenth century that seem likely to 
hold their own are Hume and Gibbon, — the former, probably, because he has no com- 
petitor on exactly the same ground. The modern school exacts of historians certain 
fundamental qualities, without which no one can be accepted ; and these qualities 
are zeal and judgment in the quest of original authorities, and fidelity and impar- 
tiality of statement. The absence of these qualities cannot be compensated for by any 
graces of style or depth of philosophy. Judged by such a test, then, Robertson must 
be pronounced wanting. Like Hume, he failed to consult state papers, which were, 
or might readily have been, placed within his reach. Of his three great works, the 
History of America is the one that has been most severely criticized. Robertson has 
been blamed for his unwarranted partiality towards the Spanish conquerors. Even 
Lord Broiigham admits that this is a great stain upon the work. Robertson's best 
work is his History of Scotland. His style is here fresh and vigorous, and his famil- 
iarity with this subject much greater than with the others which he undertook. 

His iSf?/^^.— Robertson's style was extremely admired in his day. At present we 
should say that it is too rhetorical ; that it has too much of what Lamb called the 
three-membered period ; ?. e., a period balanced in three phrases, and each phrase 
consisting of three predicates. With all his shortcomings, however, Robertson (and 
the same applies to his contemporaries, Hume and Voltaire.) marked a new era in the 
writing of history. It was evident that henceforth the historian was not to be con- 
founded with the garrulous or the dry chronicler, but that he was expected to dis- 
play philosophic culture. He was not to content himself with the bare description 
of events, but to show the causal relations existing among them. The historian was 
to show himself capable of seizing the spirit of an age or a reign, and representing it in 
its essential features. The historians of the eighteenth century, and Robertson promi- 
nent among them, did good service — not so miich by the results which they at- 
tained, as by the novel spirit and aim which they gave to the study. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 277 

EiCHAED Watson, 1730-1780, was also a historian of some note, 
but by no means equal to the three already named. 

TTatson was educated at tlie University of Edinburgh, and at Glasgow and St. An- 
drew's; he entered the Scottish Church, and finallj' became Principal of St. Leonard's. 
He is the author of two historical works, the Life of Philip II., and the Life of 
Philip III. (of Spain) These works are written in a graceful and spirited style, 
but are not original, either in tone or in research. The author followed Dr. Robertson 
too closely to be independent, and was not sufficiently aware of the prime necessity 
of authentic contemporary documents in writing the history of any period. His 
Philip II., moreoTer, has been completely superseded by Prescott's great work, so far 
as this last extends. 

Maepherson. 

James Macpbersou, 1738-1796, one of the literary celeb- 
rities of this period, is chiefly distinguished for his connec- 
tion with the publication of the Poems of Ossian. 

Maepherson was a native of Scotland. He was educated at Aber- 
deen and Edinburgh, and held various political appointments under 
the English and East India Governments. He is the author of several 
historical works, of comparatively little value, such as the History of 
Great Britain from the Bestoration to the House of Hanover ; also of 
a reply to the Declaration of Independence. But he is almost ex- 
clusively known by his celebrated Ossianic publications. 

History of the Ossianic Poems. — The external history of these 
poems is briefly as follows. While a tutor in the family of Mr. 
Graham, Maepherson exhibited to John Home, the author of Doug- 
las, specimens of translations from Gaelic poetry such as was recited 
among the inhabitants of the Highlands. Home communicated these 
to Blair, Eobertson, Ferguson, and others, who encouraged Maepher- 
son to publish his translations. Accordingly, in 1760, appeared Frag- 
ments of Ancient Poetry Collected in the Highlands of Scotland and 
Translated from the Gaelic. The work attracted so much attention 
that a subscription Avas raised to enable Maepherson to extend his re- 
searches. This he did, making a tour through the Highlands in com- 
pany with Lachlan and Ewan Maepherson and Capt. Alexander 
Morrison. The materials thus collected were arranged and translated 
by James Maepherson in the winter of 1761-2, and were presented to 
the world shortly afterwards, 1762 and 1763, in the shape of two Epic 
poems, Fingal and Temora, purporting to be translated from the Gaelic 
of Ossian, son of Fingal. 

Effect of the PuhJicntioti. — These two books created a new era in literature. 
Their fame ran like wildfire throughout Europe ; they were admired, read, and trans- 
24 



278 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPOE ARIES . 

lated into all the leading languages of the continent, and were eagerly taken up l>y 
some of the most distinguished men of letters of the day, such as Goethe, Wielan.I, 
Hume the historian, and others. On the other hand, there were many who rose in 
opposition, headed by Dr. Johnson. The great English lexicographer did not hesitate 
to pronounce the entire body of poetry an imposition, and Macpherson the originator. 
Ever since then the contest has been waged hotly, with more of vituperation, it must 
be admitted, than of argument on either side. Dr. Johnson was, as usual, thick- 
headudly obstinate, and Macpherson lost his temper. 

State of the Controversy.— General opinion had, until recently, settled down in 
favor of Johnson's view of the case. But of late the matter has been most carefully 
and elaborately investigated by the Highland Society, and by Dean Lismore, J. F. 
Campbell, Archibald McNeil, and Rev. Archibald Clerk. The last mentioned has 
fairly exhausted the subject, at least so far as Macpherson"s sincerity is concerned. 
From the very beginning of the controversy, one thing is evident — that neither Dr. 
Johnson nor anyone of his immediate school knew a word of Gaelic, and they were, for 
that very reason, incapable of forming a correct opinion. They demanded direct evi- 
dence for or against an allegation of forgery in a case where nothing would answer 
but the most delicate investigation by experts. The haste Avith which they jumped 
at their conclusions, and the recklessness with which they enforced them, are charac- 
teristic of Dr. Johnson in particular, and of the eighteenth century in general. 

The Hesiilt. — The result of seventy years of philological investigation maybe 
briefly summed up thus : that Macpherson did collect, on his journey, a mass of native 
poetry, principally from recitation ; that he worked up these fragments into shape, in 
Gaelic, by means of omissions and transposition, so as to form a continuous manu- 
script, which is now extant; and that the Fingal and Temora are pretty close trans- 
lations from this manuscript. Macpherson's character is thereby cleared from the 
charge of imposture, and his work may be justly regarded as a valuable contribution 
to literature; The task of exploring Gaelic poetry has been scarcely begun, but it 
already promises much. The character of the Ossianic poetry itself is familiar to all, 
and is as unique, in its way, as that of Iceland or of ancient India. It is probable 
that the connection between it and Irish on the one hand and Welsh on the other may 
yet be fully made out. 

John Hawkeswortli, LL.D., 1715-1773, is known as one 
of the English classical Essayists, ranking in that respect 
with Addison, Johnson, and Steele. 

Hawkeswortli was a native of London. His paper, The Adventurer 
(1752-1754), was continued for one hundred and forty numbers, of 
which lie wrote seventy. In addition to this, which was his chief 
literary work, he contributed to the Gentleman's Magazine, edited 
Swift's Works, and wrote Zimri, an Oratorio, and other Plays. He was 
also employed by the Government, at a remuneration of £6000, to pre- 
pare An Account of the Voyages of Byron, Wallis, Carteret, and Cook, 
3 vols., 4to. 

Sir John Hawkins, 1719-1789, was a member of the literary club 
of which Dr. Johnson was the centre. 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WRITERS. 279 

Being in possession of a large fortune, and having a taste for literature, Hawkins 
bestowed a good deal of his leisure time to pursuits of this kind. He edited the com- 
plete works of Dr. Johnson, and made some contributions to Shakespearian criticism. 
His chief work was A General History of the Science and Practice of Music, 5 vols., 
4to. This was an original work, coming into competition with Dr. Burney's great 
work on the same subject. The latter has been much the more popular of the two, 
being written in a more graceful style ; but the work of Hawkins is regarded as ex- 
tremely valuable for its accuracy. 

Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1723-1792, celebrated chiefly as a painter, is also known as 
an author by his Discourses on Painting, delivered before the Royal Academy. The 
Discourses are ably written, but the art-theories which they set forth have been called 
in question. Sir Joshua was, next to Vandyke, the greatest portrait painter of Eng- 
land. His historical pieces, however, are not so successful. In his manners Sir Joshua 
was extremely genial ; he enjo^'ed throughout life a high degree of popularity, and 
accumulated a large fortune. 

Horace Walpole. 

Horace Walpole, 1717-1797, is one of the literary celebri- 
ties of the last century. Although he achieved no great 
work of his own, he is so mixed up with the works and the 
personal affairs of others who did achieve greatness, that no 
history of the period is complete which does not include him 
as one of the leading figures. 

Career. — Walpole was the youngest son of Sir Robert Walpole, and 
eventually succeeded his father in the title of Earl of Orford. After 
figuring for a while in politics, and holding for several years a seat in 
Parliament, he retired to private life. Purchasing a small estate near 
Twickenham, which he called " Strawberry Hill," he gave himself up 
to the decoration of the house and grounds and to the gratification of 
his whims. He had a private printing-press at Strawberry Hill, which 
he used in printing his own works and some others. The house itself 
he filled with odds and ends of all kinds, antique armor, books, en- 
gravings, and articles of vertu. 

CJiaracter. — In his personal character Walpole decidedly affected the paradoxi- 
cal. A royalist at heart, he professed to be republican, even hanging up in his study a 
fac-simile of the death-warrant of Charles I., with the title Major Charta. Ostensibly 
shunning court life, he was an eager collector of every scrap of court gossip. He pro- 
fessed aversion to being regarded as a man of letters, and yet he craved praise, and was 
unusually sensitive to criticism. It may be observed, however, that Macaulay's sketch 
of his life and character is palpably overdrawn. Miss Berry, who had every oppor- 
tunity of knowing Walpole intimately, especially in the latter portion of his life, 
gives in her Memoirs a mtich more favorable estimate of his talents and character. 
According to her, Walpole was a true and amiable friend to those whom he really 
liked, and his taste as a collector was really remarkable. 



280 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Works, — Walpole's works are not of great importance, being all more or less 
spoiled by dilettanteism. Among them are his Aedes Walpolianse, or catalogue of his 
father's pictures, his Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors, his Catalogue of Engrav- 
ers (handsomely illustrated), his Castle of Otranto, a wild romance which is commonly 
regarded as the parent of the Radcliffe and Lewis school of fiction, and the Mysterious 
Mother, a powerful but revolting drama much admired by Byron. Walpole's literary 
remains are much more important than the works published during his life. They 
consist of his Correspondence, first published complete in 1857, by Peter Cunningham, 
and his Memoirs of the last ten years of the reign of George II,, and the first twelve 
of that of George III. Both letters and memoirs are alike in tone, spicy, clever, gos- 
sipy. They can scarcely be regarded as furnishing material for history, inasmuch as 
they are too one-sided and prejudiced. But they certainly give a good insight into the 
political, social and literary feuds of the time, and are, through their style and caustic 
humor, among the most entertaining personal records in the language. 

John Wilkes. 

John Wilkes, 1727-1797, one of the notorieties of English 
politics, is known to literature by his violent partisan writings 
in The North Briton. 

Career. — Wilkes was educated at the University of Leyden, where 
he acquired a life-long fondness for the classics. In 1749 he married 
an heiress, and was for a while the centre of an extensive social circle. 
But his dissipated habits and immorality led to a separation. He 
turned his attention to politics, was elected Sheriif of Buckinghamshire, 
and also returned to Parliament. In 1762 he founded The North 
Briton, in which he attacked Lord Bute's ministry unsparingly. No. 
45 of the paper boldly charged the King with having uttered falsehood. 
His papers were seized and he himself was imprisoned in the Tower on 
a general warrant, but was released by Chief- Justice Pratt. Wilkes was 
expelled from the House of Commons, and was re-elected four times by 
the same constituency, but each time rejected by the House. He was 
then elected Sheriff of London, and finally admitted to the House in 
1774. During all this stormy period, Wilkes was looked upon by his 
admirers as a political martyr. His success, in fact, was due to the 
blunders of the Government. His arrest on general warrant was 
clearly unconstitutional, and so also was his rejection by the House. 
Many were forced to side with him, on principles of abstract justice, 
who thoroughly mistrusted and despised him. 

Conviction for Ohsceniti/. — While absent at one time in France, he was con- 
victed of having published an obscene poem. It is doubtful whether Wilkes was reallj' 
the author of this poem. The work was printed privately, was only begun, not finished, 
and, according to Wilkes's statement, not a copy of this fragment was ever dis- 
tributed. In no legal sense, therefore, can he be said to have published the work. 
The copy on which the Government accusation rested was stolen from his ofiice. In 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITEES. 281 

looking back upon the entire Wilkes trouble it certainly seems that the English Gov- 
ernment was bent upon stultifying itself. 

Works. — Wilkes merits some place in the history of English literature in virtue 
of his articles in The North Briton, and of his Collected Speeches, publislied by himself 
in 1786. His Letters to his Daughter was published in 1804, with a Sketch of his Life, 
and his Geueral Correspondence in 1805. He possessed a sharp, incisive style, and 
unparalleled audacity. The chief interest of his writings, however, lies not so much 
in their intrinsic excellence as in the political tempest which they aroused. 

" Wilkes had, till very lately, been known chiefly as one of the most profane, licen- 
tious, and agreeable rakes about town. He was a man of taste, reading, and engag- 
ing manners. His sprightly conversation was the delight of the green-rooms aud 
taverns, aud pleased even grave hearers when he was sufficiently under restraint to 
abstain from detailing the particulars of his amours and from breaking jests on the 
New Testament. His expensive debaucheries forced him to have recourse to the 
JeAvs. He was soon a ruined man, and determined to try his chance as a political ad- 
venturer. In Parliament he did not succeed. His speaking, though pert, was feeble, 
and by no means interested his hearers so much as to make them forget his face, 
which was so hideous that the caricaturists were forced, in their own despite, lo flatter 
him. As a writer he made a better figure." — Macaulay. 

James Ealph, 1762, was a native of Philadelphia, but went 

in 1724 to London in company with Franklin, and there led a some- 
what irregular life as a political pamphleteer, dramatist, and poet. 

Ralph espoused the cause of the Prince of Wales, was "bought off" by Walpole, and 
on the accession of George III. received a pension. The titles of his poetical pieces 
are the following: The Muse's Address to the King, an Ode; The Terror of Death, a 
Poem ; Night, a Poem ; Clarinda, or the Fair Libertine, a Poem ; The Law of Liberty, 
a Poem; The Fashionable Lady, a Comedy; Fall of the Earl of Essex, a Tragedy ; The 
Jiawyer's Feast, a Farce ; The Astrologer, a Comedy. Franklin tried to dissuade Ralph 
from attempting poetry, which was evidently not his vocation, but " he continued 
scribbling verses till Pope cured him." The dose which is supposed to have wrought 
this cure, was the following lines from the Dunciad: 

" Silence, ye wolves, while Ralph to Cynthia howls, 
And makes night hideous : answer him, ye owls." 
The Groans of Germany, a political pamphlet, had a large sale, fifteen thousand copies. 
The Case of Authors by Profession, or The Case Stated in regard to Booksellers, 
the Stage, and the Public, was an essay of considerable merit and of sober sense. 
Ralph wrote also A History of England during the Reigns of King William and Queen 
Anne, and George I., which is commended by Fox. 

Abraham Tucker, 1705-1774, was born in London, and studied 
at Oxford. lie purchased a countrj^-seat near Dorking, in 1727, and 
resided there in retirement till his death. He wrote several works, 
but is known by one only, The Light of Nature. It has passed 
through many editions, and is usually in several volumes. It is a 
metaphysical work, but is discursive and entertaining, and was greatly 
admired by Paley and Mackintosh, Paley acknowledging himself in- 
24^ 



282 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

debted to Tucker for some of Ms best thoughts, and especially for his 
illustrations of abstract truth. 

SoAME Jenyns, 1704-1787, educated at Cambridge, was for nearly 
forty years a member of Parliament. He was noted as a wit and 
conversationist, and was the author of several poems and a number of 
religious and political essays. 

Jenyns's two most noted works are his Free Inquiry into the Origin of Evil, pub- 
lished in 1757, and his View of the Internal Evidence of the Christian Religion, in 
1776. In the interval between these two works, Jenyns had been converted from 
scepticism, and the latter work was intended by tbe author to counteract tlie former. 
Neither can be said to have any permanent value. During the American. Revolution 
Jenyns published a Tract on American Taxation, in which he defended the right and 
expediency of taxing the Colonies, and ridiculed the idea of an independent Parlia- 
ment. His complete works, with a biography, were published in 179U, i vols., 8vo, 

Kames. 

Henry Home, Lord Kames, 1696-1782, has an honorable 
place in literature by his essay on the Elements of Criticism, 
which has a permanent value, and is one of the standard 
works on that subject. 

Kames was a native of Berwickshire, Scotland. He studied law and 
was made Judge of the Court of Sessions, and, in 1763, one of the 
Lords of Justiciary. He published a number of legal treatises and 
pamphlets of value. Apart from these, his fame as a writer rests upon 
the work already named. The Elements of Criticism, which was pub- 
lished in 1762, and has run through fourteen or fifteen editions down 
to the present day. Although much in it has been discarded, the work 
is still freely used and approved. 

" The Elements of Criticism, considered as the first systematical attempt to investi- 
gate the metaphysical principles of the fine arts, possesses, in spite of its numerous 
defects, both in point of taste and of philosophy, infinite merits, and will ever be re- 
garded as a literary wonder by those who know how small a portion of his time it 
was possible for the author to allot to the composition of it, amidst the imperious and 
multifarious duties of a most active and useful life." — Dugald Stewart. 

James Harris, 1709-1780, is known as the author of Hermes, an 
ingenious work on Language and Grammar. 

Harris was a nephew of Shaftesburj^ and a member of Parliament. He occupied 
various civil offices of high distinction. He was a man of great erudition, and was 
particularly versed in the Greek and Latin classics. His chief publications are the 
following: Hermes, or a Philosophical Inquiry concerning Language and Universal 
Grammar; The Spring, a Pastoral; Philosophical Arrangements ; Philological Inqui- 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 283 

ries ; Treatises on Art, Music, Painting, and Poetry, etc. Harris's Hermes is his best 
work, and is even yet often quoted. 

David Fordyce, 1711-1751, w^as a native of Aberdeen, and a graduate of Marisclial 
College, in which institution he was afterwards Professor of Moral Philosophy. He 
was drowned off the coast of Holland, on his return from a continental tour, in 1751, 
at the age of forty. He wrote Dialogues concerning Education, 2 vols., 8vo ; The- 
odorus, a Dialogue concerning the Art of Preaching; Elements of Moral Philosophy ; 
The Temple of Virtue, a Dream. — James Fordyce, D. D., 1720-1796, was a brother of 
David Fordyce, and, like him, a native of Aberdeen and a graduate of Marischal Col- 
lege. He was minister to a dissenting congregation in London. He published, be- 
sides several Sermons and Poems, Addresses to Young Men ; Character and Conduct 
of the Female Sex ; Sermons to Young Women. The last is the one best known. 

John Brown, D.D., 1716-1766, was a writer on theological and general subjects, 
whose works had an extensive circulation about the middle of the last century. His 
publications are the following: An Estimate of the Manners and Principles of the 
Times ; Essays on Shaftesbury's Characteristics ; Dissertation on Poetry and Music ; 
Honor, a Poem ; A Defence of Pitt. The reply to Shaftesbury was written at the sug- 
gestion of Pope and Warburton, and passed through many editions. The v.ork first 
named passed through several editions in a little more than a year. Dr. Brown com- 
mitted suicide in a fit of temporary insanity. 

SiB John Hill, M.D., 1716-1775, originally an apothecary, wrote many books, on 
almost all sorts of subjects, medicine, botany, natviral philosophy, natural history, 
dramas, novels, etc. The Essays on Natural Philosophy and History are considered 
his best. He managed to quarrel with the Eoyal Society, with Garrick, and to make 
himself generally notorious. " A large volume might be written on the life and ad- 
ventures of this extraordinary man, as affording a complete history of literary quack- 
ery, every branch of which he pursued with a greater contempt for character than 
perhaps any man in our time." — Chalmers's Biog. Diet. 

Joseph Spence, 1699-1768, is now known almost exclusively by 
his Anecdotes. 

Spence studied at Oxford, and took orders in the Church of England. He travelled 
on the continent as companion to the Diike of Dorset and the Duke of Newcastle. 
Upon his return he was appointed Professor of Modern History at Oxford, and subse- 
quently prebendary of Durham Cathedral. Spence was the author of numerous 
works and essays, the most important of which are Polymetis, or an Inquiry into the 
Agreement between the Ancient Poets and the Ancient Artists, and an Essay on 
Pope's Translation of the Odyssey. Spence's valuable collection of Anecdotes of Books 
and Men was not published until 1820, although it had been previously used in manu- 
script by Warton, Johnson, and others. 

Tyrwhitt. 

Thomas Tyrwhitt, 1730-1786, a distinguished critic of 
the last century, has secured for himself a permanent place 
in English literature by his valuable labors in the elucida- 
tion of Chaucer. 



284 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Tyrwliitt was born in London, and educated at Eton and at Oxford. 
He was Under-Secretary of War in 1756, and Clerk of the House of 
Gammons from 1762 to 1768 ; also, Curator of the British Museum. 
The last eight years of his life were spent in literary retirement. Mr. 
Tyrwhitt published several learned works, Latin and English, but is 
now known almost exclusively by his labors on Chaucer. 

Tyrwhitt's editio of The Canterbury Tales, 1776-78, was the first serious and credit- 
able attempt to rescue any part of the text of Chaucer from the shockingly corrupt 
state in which it had apijeared in the earlier editions. Nothing is more disgraceful to 
English scholarship than the long-continued neglect on this subject ; the greatest poet 
in the language, before Shakespeare, remaining for four centuries almost unintelligi- 
ble for want of proper editing. Tyrwhitt, by his edition of The Canterbury Tales, did 
an immense service, by showing what a mine of wealth here lay hidden. The vein 
thus opened has been followed up by other explorers. But we still lack a really good 
text of England's first great poet. 

Thomas Leland, D. D., 1722-1785, was a native of Dublin, and a graduate of Trinity 
College, of that city. He M'as an eloquent preacher and writer, but is chiefiy known 
in literature as a translator. " Leland's Demosthenes " is familiar to school-boj's to 
the present day. Dr. Leland's Translation of the Orations of Demosthenes is a schol- 
arly performance, and besides its accuracy possesses great literary merit. It was 
originally published in sumptuous style, in 3 vols., 4to. Some of Leland's other works 
are the following: The Orations of ^schines and Demosthenes on the Crown, trans- 
lated into English, with notes ; History of the Life and lleign of Philip, King of Mace- 
don, 2 vols., 4to : Dissertations on the Principles of Pluman Eloquence ; History of Ire- 
land, 3 vols., 4:to, etc. 

Christopher Smart, 1722-1770, the well-known classical scholar and translator, was 
a student and Fellow of Cambridge. The latter part of his life was made wretched by 
intemperance, and its natural attendant, poverty. He died while a prisoner of the 
Court of the King's Bench. His principal works are the Hilliad, a satire against Sir 
JohnHill, and the prose translations of Horace and Phasdrus. Smart's Horace, although 
not satisfying the demands of present scholarship, has long been and continues to be 
the favorite " crib " or " pony " for each successive generation of school-boys. Smart 
also translated into verse the Psalms of David and The Parables of Christ. 

William Smith, D. D., 1711-1787, a graduate of Oxford and a dignitary of the Church 
of England, is known chiefly by his Translations of Longinus on the Sublime, Thu- 
cydides's History of the Peloponnesian War, and Xenophon's History of Greece. 

William Melmoth, 1666-1743, a learned jurist, is known to general literature by a 
work, The Great Importance of a Religious Life, of which more than one hundred 
thousand copies were sold between 1743 and 1782. — William Melmoth, 1710-1799, 
was a son of the preceding, and, like his father, a jurist. He lived, however, chiefly 
in retirement, and devoted himself to literary pursuits. He is known mainly by his 
Letters on various subjects and by his Translations. " Melnioth's Letters " was once 
a work in great demand, which everybody was expected to read who professed to be 
acquainted with polite literature. Melmoth translated Pliny's Letters, Cicero's Let- 
ters, and Cicero's essays on Friendship and Old Age. He published some other works, 
but his Letters and his Translations from Pliny and Cicero are the chief. He lived 
to his ninetieth year, and was greatly respected. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 285 

" William Melmotb, Esq., was a most elegant and distinguished writer, ' near half an 
age with every good man's praise.' His translations of Cicero and Pliny will speak 
for him while Roman and English eloquence can be united. Mr. Melmoth is a happy 
example of the mild influence of learning on a cultivated mind ; I mean of that 
learning which is declared to be the aliment of youth and the delight or the consola- 
tion of declining years. Who would not envy the 'fortunate old man' his most fin- 
ished translation and comment on Tully's Cato? or, rather, who would not rejoice in 
the refined and mellowed pleasures of so accomplished a gentleman and so liberal a 
scholar?" — Pursuits of Literature. 

JoHX Logan, 1748-178S, was a native of Scotland, and a minister in the Scottish 
Church, but left his congregation and removed to London. There he became a con- 
tributor to the English Review, and the author of several works. The best known 
are: Essay on the Manners of Asia; Review of the Principal Charges against War- 
ren Hastings (pronounced, by Macaulay, "of great ability"); two volumes of Ser- 
mons, and one volume of Poems. 

" The sermons of Logan, though not so exquisitely polished as those of Blair, pos- 
sess in a high degree the animated and passionate expression of Massillon and Atter- 
bury." — Dr. Anderson. 

Gilbert Stuart, 1742-1786, was a native of Scotland, and son 
of George Stuart, Professor in the University of Edinburgh. Gilbert 
Stuart was a man of decided ability, but of an extremely unhappy dis- 
position. His life appears to have been frittered away in literary 
quarrels or wasted away in dissipation. He was associated with Wil- 
liam Sraellie in the old Edinburgh Magazine and Beview. One of the 
many objects of his envy and dislike was Dr. Robertson, the historian. 

Stuart's principal works are : A Historical Dissertation on the Antiquity of the 
British Constitution; A View of the Society of Europe in its Progress from Rudeness to 
Refinement, and A PTistory of Scotland from the Establishment of the Reformation till 
the Death of Queen Mary. In this last work he intentionally took a view of Mary's 
conduct diametrically opposite to that of Robertson. Stuart was pronounced by Pro- 
fessor Smyth to be "a very able, though somewhat impetuous, inquirer into the earlier 
parts of our history." 

Lord Lyttleton. 

Lord George Lyttleton, 1708-1773, is the author of an 
ingenious essay, of permanent value, on the Conversion of 
St. Paul, proving from it the divine origin of Christianity. 

Lyttleton was educated at Eton and Oxford, and entered Parliament 
with prospects of a brilliant career. After a brief experience of po- 
litical life, however, he resigned his office, that of Chancellor of the 
Exchequer, and retired to private life. 

Lyttleton employed his leisure in literary pursuits. Among his early productions 
are Letters from a Persian in England to his Friend in Ispahan; Progress of Love, a 



286 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Poem ; Monody to the Memory of a Lady Lately Deceased (his wife). The Persian Let- 
ters are mentioned very slightingly by the critics of the day. The Monody is often 
quoted, and usually with respect. His next production, Observations on the Conver- 
sion and Apostleship of St. Paul, is still regarded as a masterpiece in its way. This 
beautiful monograph is an ingenious and unanswerable argument for the divine origin 
of Christianity. Dialogues of the Dead was another work on which Ly ttleton expended 
much labor. It shows learning and study, and a familiar acquaintance with the his- 
torical characters introduced, but is now generally considered dull and prolix. His 
most elaborate performance was A History of the Ileign of Henry II., 4 vols., ito. " It 
is heavy and prolix, but trustworthy, and contains searching investigations into^ the 
laws, policy, character, and events of that reign." — CJiancellor Kent. 

George Psalmanazae, 1679-1763, was a literary impostor, about 
whose real name and origin there is some doubt. 

Psalmanazar is supposed to have been born in the south of France. At the age of 
sixteen, he conceived the idea of passing himself off for a native of the island of For- 
mosa. He assumed the name given above, invented a Formosan language, and trans- 
lated the Church Catechism into it. He also wrote an imaginary description of his 
island, and succeeded so well in his impostures as to deceive the Bishop of London 
and other eminent scholars. After a variety of adventures, he became penitent, con- 
fessed his impostui-es, and led for nearly half a century a studious and blameless life. 
He wrote Historical and Geographical Description of Formosa; Dialogue between a 
Japanese and a Formosan; An Inquiry into the Objections against George Psalmana- 
zar of Formosa, with his Answer, etc. In his later days, he associated much with 
Dr. Johnson. 

" Among Johnson's associates at this time may be mentioned the penitent impostor, 
George Psalmanazar, who, after poring all day, in an humble lodging, on the folios 
of Jewish rabbis and Christian Fathers, indulged himself at night with literary and 
theological conversation at an ale-house in the city." — Macaulay. 



Mrs. Elizabeth Carter. 

Elizabeth Carter, 1717-1806, known in her later days as 
Mrs. Carter, as was the custom in England with single 
ladies after reaching a matronly age, was celebrated for her 
classical scholarship. 

Mrs. Carter received from her father, who was a clergyman, a 
thorough training in the knowledge of Latin and Greek, and she made 
herself familiar with Italian, German, French, and Spanish. She pub- 
lished an Ode to Wisdom, and a volume of Poems; and she translated 
into English an Italian work. Explanation of Newton's Philosophy 
for the Use of Ladies. The work which gained her most eclat was a 
translation of Epictetus, which, in Warton's opinion, " exceeds the 
original," Dr. Johnson was a great admirer of Mrs. Carter's talents and 
scholarship. " I have composed a Greek epigram to Eliza^ and think 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WKITERS. 287 

she ought to be celebrated in as many languages as Lewis le Grand." 
— Johnson. Upon hearing a lady commended for her learning, Dr. 
Johnson said, '^ A man is, in general, better pleased when he has a good 
dinner upon his table, than when his wife talks Greek. My old friend 
Mrs. Carter could make a pudding as well as translate Epictetus from 
the Greek." On another occasion, speaking of some eminent scholar, 
he said, " Sir, he is the best Greek scholar in England, except Eliza- 
betk Carter." There was nothing of the pedant, however, about this 
excellent woman. She was as much distinguished by her modesty 
and piety, and by the quiet elegance of her conversation, as by her 
learning. 

Lady Mary Montagu. 

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, 1690-1762, is connected 
f bout equally with the age of Pope and that of Dr. Johnson. 
Bhe fills a considerable space in the history of the times, by 
the distinguished part which she played in social and diplo- 
matic circles, by her intelligent and philanthropic efforts in 
the matter of inoculation for the small-pox, and by her Let- 
ters, which have become a valuable part of literary history. 

Career. — Lady Mary AVortley was the daughter of the Duke of 
Kingston. Her husband being appointed ambassador to Turkey, Lady 
Mary accompanied him, and wrote to her friends at home a series of 
Letters, which were surreptitiously published in 1763, and permanently 
established the writer's fame. 

Character and Writings. — Lady Mary was a noted wit, and her house was a 
meeting-phice fOr men of letters and fashion. She was at one time very intimate with 
Pope, bnt afterwards quarrelled with him and became the object of his satire. She 
published during her lifetime some poems and a few essays, which have fallen into 
utter neglect. As a Avriter she is known to the public solely by her Letters. These 
are full of the gossip and scandal of the day, witty in descriptions, shrewd, and easy 
both in stylo and morals. They are the English counterpart of Madame de Sevigne's 
celebrated letters, but are shrewder and more forcible, and also more sarcastic. As 
specimens of epistolary style they are among the best in English literature. 

A. JPhilnnthropist. — Lady Mary's name must not be forgotten, however, as that 
of a public benefactor. She was the means of introducing into England the Turkish 
practice of inoculation for small-pox, boldly subjecting her own children to the then 
dreaded operation. It was not until .Tenner introduced the still better system of 
vaccination that her benefaction was superseded. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu, 1720-1800, belongs almost equally to 
the age of Dr. Johnson and to that of Cowper. 



288 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Mrs. Montagu was the daughter of Matthew Robinson, and was by marriage cousin of 
the celebrated Lady Mary Montagu. Mrs. Montagu's husband, Edward Montagu, died 
in 1775, leaving her in the enjoyment of a large fortune. Her liouse became the centre of 
literature and fashion. Her soirees were thronged with all the literary notabilities of 
the day. Mrs. Montagu herself was noted for her conversational powers, but she pro- 
duced little in the way of author.-hip. Her only work of repute is an Essay on Shake- 
speare, written in reply to Yoltaire. It is good as a refutation of Voltaire's flippancy, 
but has scarcely any positive merit of its own. The Letters of Mrs. Montagu, in two 
parts, were published after her death. They are lively, '" gossipy " effasions, and form 
apart of the literary history of the times. 

Mrs. Hester Chapone, 1727-lSOl, showed at the age of nine a decided taste for lite- 
rary pursuits. She made the acquaintance of Mr. Chapone at the house of Richardson 
the novelist. Mrs. Chapone was acquainted Avith Dr. Johnson, and was for half a century 
the intimate friend of Mrs. Elizabeth Carter. She published Letters on the Improve- 
ment of the Mind ; Letters to a New Married Lady ; Miscellanies in Prose and Terse. 

Sir James Porter, 1720-1786, was English Ambassador at Constantinople from 1747 
to 1762, besides diplomatic service at other Courts. lie was a man of letters and sci- 
ence, and wrote several valuable works : Observations on the Religion, Laws, Govern- 
ment, and Manners of the Turks; The Plague at Constantinople ; Astronomical and 
Physical Observations in Asia, etc. His grandson published, in 1854, Turkey, its HLs- 
toi-y and Progress, based upon Sir James's journal and correspondence. 

Munchausen's Travels. 

Munchausen's Travels are worthy of note among the 
curiosities of literature. The history of this singular 'work 
is quite as remarkable as the work itself. 

E-udolph Erich Easpe "n^as a learned German, connected at one time 
with the library of the University of Gottuigen, afterwards a Professor 
at Cassel, and Keeper of the antique gems and medals belongmg to the 
Elector of Hesse. Being detected in a theft of some of the treasures 
committed to his keeping, Kaspe fled to England. There he fell into 
want, and finally, in order to earn his bread, he became a waiter in a 
German coffee-house. While in this humble position, he betook him- 
self to the preparation of the curious literary work which has been 
named, and he has thus become famous, though his connection with it 
has only of late been fully known. 

The Story of Jlliinchaitsen. — In the latter part of the last century, a certain 
Baron Munchausen was living in the Electorate of Hanover. He had been engaged 
in early life in the Russian service against the Turks, and had experienced many wild 
adventures. He was a rollicking, jovial fellow, fond of the chase and of good cheer, 
famous for his hospitality and for his endless supply of capital stories. When the 
good baron had anj' guests who were given to drawing the long bow, he sometimes 
quietly punished them by telling stories of his own experience far transcending any- 
thing of theirs, and told so gravely that it was not easy to know when he Avas in 
earnest and when he was poking fun at his auditors. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 289 

Origin and Cliaracter of the Work. — Easpc had often been at the Baron's 
table, and lieard many of these marvellous tales. ^^ hen leading his miserable life in 
London, he bethought himself of those stories, and wrote out some of them from 
memory for publication. The publication being successful, he prepared a second and 
a third edition, each time enlarging and adding to the stock, from his own invention 
as well as from memory, until The Travels of Baron Munchausen became a really 
curious and unique book, hardly inferior to Swift's Travels of Gulliver. It has been 
translated into a great many languages, and has passed through almost innumerable 
editions. It is one of the books which have been illustrated by Gustave Dore. Soon 
after its first appearance, its republication in Gottingen was attempted, but Munchau- 
sen, who was then living, began legal proceedings and stopped the publication. The 
Baron died in 1797. Raspe's book was first published in London In 1785. The two 
most striking of these stories are that of the soimds which were frozen up and after- 
wards thawed out, and that of the cherrj'-stone shot into a stag's head, which sprouted 
and grew up into a tree. 

JoxATHA>' Scott, LL. D., a learned Orientalist, Persian Secretary to Warren Has- 
tings, translated many beautiful things from the Arabic and the Persian: Bahar- 
Danush, a romance from the Persian ; Tales, Anecdotes, and Letters, from the Arabic 
and the Persian ; Ferishta's History of the Dekkan, etc. 

Robert Wood, 1716-1771, is known bv his work on Palmyra and 
Baalbec. 

TTood was born at Riverstown, Ireland, and educated at Oxford. In 1759 Chatham 
made him Under-Secretary of State, which post he held for many years. He travelled 
in the East, and published by far the best descriptions which up to that time had been 
given of some of the ancient cities: The Ruins of Palmyra, with fifty-seven Plates ; 
The Ruins of Baalbec, with forty-six Plates; View of the Ancient and Present Troas, 
folio. These works, particularly those on Palmyra and Baalbec, were remarkable for 
the beauty of the plates, the accuracy of the measurements, and the elegance of thg 
descriptions ; and these qualities, added to the wonderful character of the antiquitiea 
themselves, caused the works to produce a profound impression. 

Lord George A^.^sox, 1697-17G2, is celebrated for. his Toyage Round the TTorld, a 
work not written by himself, but compiled from his papers and published under his 
direction. Anson"s Yuyago was a work of great repute in its day, and according to the 
Edinburgh Review " it is still about the most delightful of any with which we are 
acquainted." It was published in 174:0-44:. 

John Beli, 1691-1780, a Scotch traveller, published Travels from St. Petersburg in 
Russia to Divers Parts of Asia, 2 vols., -Ito, 17GC, of which the London Quarterly Re- 
view says it is "the best model for travel-writing in the English language." 

Captaix James Cook, 1728-1779, was a famous English navigator, who was killed in 
a quarrel with the native? at Owyhee, Sandwich Islands. His Toyages are the most 
noted of ail those undertaken by the British. The account of them, made up from 
his notes, was published by the Admiralty in 8 vols., 4to, richly ornamented with 
plates by the most eminent artists. 

Davtd Dalrtmple, Lord Hailes, 1726-1792, a native of Edinburgh, was a lawyer of 
repute, and an industrious historian and antiquaiy. His chief publication was An- 
-25 T 



290 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

nals of Scotland: it is a standard work on that subject. — Alexaxder Dalrymple, 
1737-1808, brother of Lord Ilailes, was hydrographer to the East India Company and 
afterwards to the Admiralty, and is especially known for his zeal in collecting and 
publishing authentic accounts of Voyages to the South Seas.— John Dalrymple, Earl 
of Stair, d. 1789, wrote much on subjects connected with political economy and 
affairs of State: The State of the National Debt: State of the Public Debts; Limits 
of Government Interference with the East India Company, etc. — Sir John Dalrymple, 
172&-1810, Baron of the Exchequer in Scotland, wrote many works on political sub- 
jects: A General History of Funded Property in Great Britain; The Policy of Entails 
in a Nation ; Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland, etc. 

Bruce the Traveller. 

James Bruce, 1730-1794, a Scotchman, descended from 
the royal house of Bruce, has a world-wide reputation as a 
traveller and a writer of travels. 

While residing at Algiers as British Consul, it was proposed to Bruce 
that he should explore the antiquities of Barbary. Having spent a 
year and more in this work, he next visited Baalbec and Palmyra. 
Then he made a journey into Abyssinia to discover the source of the 
Mle. Having discovered the source of the Blue Nile, in doing which 
he encountered many dangers and hardships, he returned to England 
and published an account of his travels and discoveries, in 5 vols., 4to. 

" Who has not heard of Bruce,— the romantic, the intrepid, the indefatigable Bruce ? 
His tale was once suspected; but suspicion has sunk into acquiescence of its truth. 
A more enterprising, light, but lion-hearted traveller never left liis native hills for the 
accomplishment of such purposes as those which Bruce accomplished." — Dihdin. 

Joseph Edmondson, 1786, is one of the celebrated antiquaries of England. His 

publications are numerous and elaborate, and are the more remarkable from the fact 
that he was originally a barber, without the advantages of early education. The fol- 
lowing are his principal works : A Complete Body of Heraldry, 2 vols., fol. ; Pedigree 
of the English Peers, 6 vols., fol.; Companion to the Peerage of Great Britain and Ire- 
land, 8vo ; Historical Account of the Greville Family, 8vo, etc. 

Sir Joseph Ayloffe, 1709-1781, a graduate of Oxford, was highly distinguished as 
an antiquary. There are no independent publications of his own, but he aided largely 
in sevei-al other important works. He completed Mo.?iart"s Calendar of Ancient Char- 
ters, aided in the publication of Thorp's Registrum Roifense, and of the Vetusta 
Monumenta, and wrote some of the descriptions of the monuments in Westminster 
Abbey for Gough's Sepulchral Monuments of Great Britain. He contributed papers 
also to the Ai-chajologia. Gough styles Ayloffe the Montfaucon of England. 

William Oldys, 1696-17 G1, was a zealous collector of books, and was indefatigable 
in the cause of English bibliography. He was librarian to Harley, Earl of Oxford. 
The British Librarian, a bibliographical worli, and a Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, are 
the only publications of his generally known. The style of this latter is heavy, but it 
abounds in curious information, 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WRITEES. 291 

Richard Farmer, D. D., 1735-1769, a learned divine of the Church of England, made 
himself famous by a collection of i-are and curious old books, and by the publication 
of An Essay on the Learning of Shakespeare. In this essay Farmer undertakes to 
prove, by a citation of examples, that the knowledge of antiquity which Shakespeare 
had was derived from translations, not from reading the original authors. 

John Fell, 1735-1797, was a Dissenting minister, and a classical teacher. He wrote 
Demoniacs, and Idolatry of Greece and Home, in criticism of the theories advanced by 
Hugh Farmer. He also wrote Genuine Protestantism ; Lectures on the Evidences of 
Christianity ; English Grammar. 

Thomas Broughton, 1704-1774, was one of the contributors to the Biographica 
Britannica. He wrote also Answer to Toland's Christianity as old as Creation; A 
Prospect of Futurity : Hercules, a Musical Drama ; Bibliotheca Historico-Sacra, aa His- 
torical Dictionary of All Religions, 2 vols., fol. 

Thomas Blackwell, 1701-1757, a Scottish critic and author. Principal of Marischal 
College, Aberdeen. Works : Inquiry into the Life and Writings of Homer, 8vo ; Let- 
ters Concerning Mythology, 8vo ; Memoirs of the Court of Augustus, 2 vols., 4to. 
Blackwell is not in high repute as a writer. He " displays more erudition than 
genius, and more affectation than elegance." 

Andrew Baxter, 1686-1750, a native of Scotland, who was employed mostly as pri- 
vate tutor to young gentlemen, published a volume of some note. An Inquiry into the 
Nature of the Human Soul, which is referred to by Hume, and is highly commended 
by Warburton. 

William Lauder, 1771, a native of Scotland, made himself notorious by hia 

abortive attempt to prove Milton a plagiarist. The works which he published in this 
attemi)t were Essay on Milton's Use and Imitation of the Moderns, Letter to the Rev. 
Mr. Douglass, The Grand Impostor Detected, or Milton Convicted of Forgery against 
Charles I. 

William Baker, 1742-1785, was an English printer, somewhat of the Robert and 
Henry Stephens's style, — a man of learning and classical scholarship, critically skilled 
in Latin, Greek, French, and Italian, with some knowledge of Hebrew. He published 
Peregrinations of the Mind by a Naturalist, and Remarks on the English Language. 

George Edwards, 1694-1773, was a distinguished naturalist. He travelled through 
the northern parts of Europe, studying and making collections. Natural History of 
Birds, etc., with continuation, 7 vols., 4to ; Essays upon Natural History, Svo. 

Henry Baker, 1703-1774, was chiefly known as a naturalist, and as acontributor to the 
Linnasan and the Philosophical Transactions. His contributions to general litei'ature 
were: Au Invocation to Health, a Poem; The Universe, a Philosophical Poem; Origi- 
nal Poems ; The Microscope made Easy ; Employment for the Microscope. He mar- 
ried a daughter of Daniel De Foe. He was noted, also, for his success in teaching the 
Deaf and Dumb, though he made a secret of his method. — David Erskine Baker, 

1774, a son of Henry Baker the naturalist, and grandson of Daniel De Foe. He 

was the original compiler of the Biographica Dramatica, in 2 vols., 1764. He pub- 
lished, also, The Muse of Ossian, and some fugitive poetry and papers in the Philo- 
sophical Transactions. — Henry Baker, also a son of Henry Baker the naturalist, and 
grandson of Daniel De Foe, wrote Essays, Pastorals and Elegiacs. 



292 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

James Burgh, 1714-1775, was a native of Scotland, and cousin of Robertson the his- 
torian. Having failed in business, he turned his attention to literary pursuits, and 
became the author of several works: Britain's Remembrancer; Thoughts on Educa- 
tion ; a Warning to Dram-Drinkers ; The True Inquix'er ; Dignity of Human Nature ; 
Political Disquisitions, etc. 

David Jennings, D. D., 1691-1762, a Dissenting clergj-man, and a tutor of divinity 
at Coward Academy, wrote An Introduction to the Use of the Globe and the Orrery, 
which held its place as a popular text-book for half a century ; An Introduction to 
the Knowledge of Medals; Jewish Antiquities, "2 vols., 8vo; The Scripture Testimony; 
Sermons to Gay People. 

William Guthrie, 1708-1770, was a Scotchman, a native of Brechin. He taught 
school for a time in Aberdeen, and afterwards went to London and followed author- 
ship. He wrote A History of England, 3 vols., fol. ; A History of the English Peerage, 
4to ; A General History of Scotland, 10 vols., 8vo; A Geheral History of the World, 
12 vols., 8vo ; besides works on Geography, Chronology, etc. He wrote also several 
political pamphlets, and contributed to the Gentleman's Magazine. 

Ferguson the Astronomer. 

James Ferguson, 1710-1776, a native of Scotland, and 
an eminent astronomer and mechanician, rose to high dis- 
tinction without any of the ordinary advantages of education. 

Ferguson was taught to read by his father, who was a common day- 
laborer, and in the various mechanical and servile occupations in 
which he was employed, he picked up knowledge by scraps from one 
and another with whom he was associated, but he never attended any 
kind of school, except for a brief period. Yet such were his ingenuity 
and his genius that he Became the inventor of many important ma- 
chines, and he was at the time of his death the greatest living astrono- 
mer in a land and an age celebrated for its philosophers. His col- 
lected works, edited by Sir David Brev/ster, fill 5 vols., 8vo, They 
consist of Astronomy, Explained upon Sir Isaac Newton's Principles, 
and made easy to those who have not studied Mathematics; Lectures 
on Select Subjects in Mechanics, Hydrostatics, Pneumatics, Optics, etc. 

"He was universally considered as at the head of astronomy and mathematics, in a 
nation of philosophers; and he might justly be styled self-taught, or rather heaven- 
taagbt, for in his whole life he had not received above half a year's instruction at 
school." — Encyclopsedia Britannica. 

Richard Rolt, 1724-1770, who took part in the Irish revolt of 1745, afterwards lived 
in London as an author. Here ho published numerous songs, sketches, miscellaneous 
articles, and one or two operas. Among his works are several volumes of histories, such 
as the History of Greece, of England, of France, etc.; also the Lives of the Principal 
Reformers. His Dictionary of Trade and Commerce is pronounced by McCuUoch, "a 
wretched compilation." 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WRITERS. 293 

Thomas Davies, 1712-1785, oue of the minor literary celebrities of the time of John- 
son, studied at the University of Edinburgh, and became author, actor, and bookseller. 
He was a good deal mixed up with the theatrical celebrities of the day, and was mar- 
ried to a famous beauty, Miss Yarrow, daughter of one of the actors. The success of 
Davies as an actor was but moderate, and he was driven fi'om the stage entirely by the 
ridicule of Churchill ; 

" With him came mighty Davies : — on my life, 
That Davies has a very pretty wife ! 
Statesman all over, — in plots famous grown, — 
He mouths a sentence as curs mouth a bone." — The Rosciad. 

The want of success as a player, however, did not lack compensations. He wrote 
A Life of David Garrick, 2 vols., 8vo, which brought him both fame and fortune. He 
wrote also Lives of Sir John Davies, John Eachard, Lillo, Henderson, Massinger, and 
others. 

William Rufus Chetwood, 1766, was connected with the dramatic literature of 

his day. lie wi'ote The Lover's Opera; Plays; A General History of the Stage; The 
British Theatre; A Life of Ben Jonson; Theatrical Records, etc. "A blockhead, and 
a measureless and bungling liar."— Steevens. 

John Campbell, LL. D., 1708-1775, was a voluminous writer, 
chiefly on historical subjects. 

Campbell was a native of Edinburgh, but went early to London, and made author- 
ship his business. His principal works are : A Military History of Prince Eugene and 
of the Duke of Marlborough, 2 vols., folio ; Lives of British Admirals, 4 vols., Svo ; 
Voynges and Travels, from Columbus to Anson, 2 vols., folio ; The Present State of 
England; The Highlands of Scotland; Trade of Great Britain to America; A Political 
Survey of Great Britain. He contributed also to the Biographia Britannica and the 
Universal History. " I think highly of Campbell. In the first place, he has very 
good parts. In the second place, he has very extensive reading; not, perhaps, what 
is properly called learning, but history, politics, and, in short, that popular knowledge 
which makes a man very useful." — Br. Sam. Jolmson. 

Thomas Birch, D. D., 1705-1766, was an historian and biographer 
of immense industry and perseverance. 

Birch's first undertaking was a translation of Bayle's General Dictionary, with ad- 
ditions and corrections, 10 vols., folio. In this work he had several assistants. Birch 
also edited Lord Thurlow's Collection of State Papers, 7 vols., folio. He wrote A His- 
tory of the Royal Society, with Supplements to the Philos. Transactions, 4 vols., 4to, 
and he left a large quantity of valuable MSS. to the British Museum. 

George Ballard, 1775, a tailor of Gloucestershire, had a great fondness for 

study, and received in consequence a pension and a small appointment at Oxford, 
which enabled him to pursue his studies. He published Memoirs of British Ladies 
Celebrated for their Writings or their Skill in the Learned Languages, Arts, or 
Sciences. Sixty-two of these celebrated women are included in his Memoirs. He left 
a large collection of manuscripts containing his I'esearches in the Bodleian Library. 
25* 



294 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Thomas Dilworth, 1780, was an English f choolmaster, whose school-books were 

in great vogue in the last century, both in England and in the colonies; indeed, their 
use in the United States continued until times within the memory of many still living. 
Works : Book-keeper's Assistant ; Schoolmasters Assistant ; Arithmetic ; Guide to the 
English Tongue, etc. 

John Entinck, 1713-1773, was employed by the booksellers in compiling various 
works: Latin and English Dictionary; The Present State of the British Empire, -I 
vols., 8vo ; A General History of the Late War [in America] 5 vols. ; A New Naval 
History, fol.; A Survey and History of London, i vols. Entinck's Latin Dictionary 
had a long run. It is even still in use. 

Thomas Nugent, 1772, is chiefly known as the compiler of Nugent's Pocket 

French Dictionary, a work which still retains its value, and has run through several 
revised editions. Mr. Nugent also ti-anslated Benvenuto Cellini's Autobiography, 
Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws, Henault's Chronological Abridgment (of the his- 
tory of France), and other works. 

William Kenrick, LL. D., 1720-1779, is now known, so far as 
known at all, mainly by his English Dictionary. 

Kenrick was a belligerent critic, who, in the pithy language of Disraeli, "could 
criticize all the genius of his age faster than it was produced." Kenrick succeeded in 
embroiling himself with almost every notable literary personage of the times, includ- 
ing Goldsmith, Johnson, Akenside, and Garrick. The last named, indeed, sued him 
for libel, in consequence of his poem called " Love in the Suds." Kenrick's principal 
works are his Epistles, Philosophical and Moral, his Review of Dr. Johnson's New 
Edition of Shakespeare, and A Dictionary of the English Language. 

John Ash, LL. D., 1724-1779, is likewise chiefly known by his English Dictionary, 
published in 1775. It is one of the standard works in the history of English lexicog- 
raphy. It contains a lax-ge number of words now obsolete, and many provincial and 
cant words. 

Four* Shakespearian Editors. 

Edward Cap:ell, 1713-1781, is distinguished for his labors as an editor of Shake- 
speare. He si)ent a great part of his life in the attempt to ascertain the true text and 
to throw light upon the meaning. His Notes and Various Readings form a part of 
the Variorum Editions, though there is much difference of opinion as to their A'alue. 
His judgment does not appear to have been equal to his industry. 

George Steevens, 1736-1800, has a place in literature as a commentator on Shake- 
speare. He was educated at Cambridge, was rich and ill-tempered, and managed for 
the raost part to keep himself and others in a ferment. He contributed to Joliiison's 
Lives of the Poets, Dodsley's Annual Register, and other works of that kind, and was 
much addicted to making anonymous attacks in the newspapers upon other authors. 
Johnson's and Steevens's edition of Shakespeare first appeared in 1773, in 10 vols., 
8vo. This was increased and supplemented by various authors, from time to time. 
The sixth edition, in 1813, combining the critical labors of Johnson, Steevens, Reed, 
and Malone, was in 21 vols., 8vo. 

Edmund Malone, 1741-1812, a native of Ireland, and a graduate of Trinity College, 
Dublin, was a gentleman of leisure, who devoted himself to literary pursuits, and 



THE NOVELISTS. 295 

chiefly to Shakespearian researches. Tie published an edition of Shakespeare, in 10 
vols.; An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of the English Stage, etc. Ma- 
lone spent much labor on his various critical editions, but he had little judgment or 
taste, and his notes and criticisms are now esteemed of almost no value. 

Isaac Reed, 1742-1S07, is also kno\\Ti by his connection with Shakespearian and dra- 
matic literatui-e. He was a lawyer by profession, but occupied himself mostly with 
books. He published an edition of Shakespeare, 10 vols. ; Dodsley's Old Plays, 12 vols.; 
contributed largely to Johnson's Lives of the Poets; and did a good deal more literary 
work of this kind. 

II. THE NOVELISTS. 

Richardson. 

Samuel Richardson, 1689-1767, came before the public 
a little earlier than his great rival. Fielding, and is some- 
times called the Father of the English Novel. But this 
epithet belongs more properly to the latter writer. Rich- 
ardson's three novels, however, Pamela, Clarissa Harlowe, 
and Sir Charles Grandison, are among the memorable works 
of the age, and ensure to their author a permanent and 
honorable place in English literature. 

Career. — Richardson was a printer by trade, and he succeeded in 
gaining for himself a competency long before he ever thought of turn- 
ing his attention to writing. As a boy he evinced a fondness for read- 
ing, and skill in the use of the pen, so that the young women of the 
village frequently employed him to write their love-letters. In this 
way Eichardson laid the foundations for that knowledge of woman's 
heart and woman's ways, which afterwards stood him in such good 
stead. Indeed, he s?eems to have been, throughout life, a chatty, not 
to say gossipy, soul, and never so much at home as when the centre 
of a small circle of kind-hearted if not particularly strong-headed 
female admirers. The greater part of Clarissa and of Sir Charles 
Grandison was thus read aloud, from day to day, in manuscript, by 
the author dressed in his morning-cap and gown. 

Works. — The composition of Pamela might almost be called an accident. Two 
booksellers applied to Richardson to write a small volume of letters on subjects that 
might be of use to country readers unable to write for themselves, or in need of advice. 
This volume was published under the title of Familiar Letters. While writing those 
of the letters which were intended to insti-uct handsome girls in service how to pro- 
tect their virtue, the story of Pamela occurred to Ricliatdson's mind, and was devel- 
oped by him into the well-known novel. The success of Pamela aroused the emula- 
tion of Fielding, then unknown to fame, and resulted in the publication of his Joseph 



296 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPOE AEIES. 

Andrews, which was intended primarily as a satire upon the sentimentalism of 
Pamela. Clarissa Harlowe, which soon followed Pamela, only heightened Kichard- 
son"s fame, and even spread it over to the continent. Diderot, among many others, 
was carried away by the work. The theme is a painful one — the long averted but 
inevitable seduction of the heroine. Sir Charles Graudison. which divides admiration 
with Clarissa, is not much different in style, and may be summed up perhaps as the 
adventures of a very proper, moral, male flirt, and the tragic madness of an interest- 
ing woman whose intense affection is thrown away upon the hero. Pamela is simply 
the story of a beautiful servant who escapes all snares and marries well and happily. 

Cliaracter of his Novels. — In judging Eichardson's merits we must take into 
account the age in which he lived and the circumstances under which he wrote. Be- 
fore him there had been no novel ; nothibg but romances in imitation of the French, 
where the loves of princes and princesses were narrated in very vaporous and stilted 
language. Richardson brought the scene from the moonshine down to the earth, and 
was the first to give a real episode from English life, with real English men and 
women for actors. 

Sentimentalism. — The characters in Richardson are all sentimental, and the 
general tone is what we might call lackadaisical But we should bear in mind that 
the eighteenth century was pre-eminently the age of sentimentality. This morbid 
state did not reach its climax, it is true, until several years later, when Rousseau gave 
it final expression and immortality in his Nouvelle Heloise and his Confessions. Still, 
the seeds had long been sown, and the crop was fast ripening to the harvest. The 
state of the public mind was that of reaction from the utter frivolitj- of the Restora- 
tion and Queen Anne. 

Mornlity . — Richardson, marked according to our standard, might be set down as 
licentious. As compared with Fielding, however, and others of his age, his works ap- 
pear to great advantage, and show a distinct moral tendency. Richardson himself 
probably never dreamed but that he was furtliering the cause of good morals ; and the 
favor with which Pamela and Clarissa were read and recommended by the best and 
wisest of the day, shows us how careful we must be in our estimates of writers of 
works of imagination. 

His Style. — As a writer, Richardson is open to grave criticism. His style is not 
finished, in our sense of the terra. There is nothing either fresh or profound about it, nor 
is it easy or racy. Upon the whole it may be pronounced plain. The plot is insuffer- 
ably tedious, and the conversation stilted. Unlike the great master of sentimentality, 
Rousseau, Richardson has no truly ideal characters, and none of those concise, passion- 
ate utterances that burn with the intensity of genius. TTith all his defects, however, 
he bus put English literature under heavy obligations. His works will always be read 
by the curious and sympathetic, and must be studied by all who wish to understand 
the course of English literature. 

Fielding. 

Henry Fielding, 1707-1754, may be considered as the 
true father of the English Novel. There were other 
writers of fiction before him, as there were other poets 
before Chaucer. But Fielding first showed by example 
the great resources and power of this species of literature, 



THE NOVELISTS. 297 

not only as a delineator of manners, but as a moral influ- 
ence iu society. 

Career. — Fielding -was of worthy stock, his father being a distin- 
guished soldier under the Duke of Marlborough. After studying at 
Eton, he was sent to the University of London to study the Civil Law ; 
but having pursued his studies there for two years, he was obliged to re- 
turn home on account of the financial difficulties of his father. At the 
age of twenty-one he began writing for the stage as a means of living, 
and he produced a large number of indifferent plays, which yielded him 
no fame and little money. After a few years, not very creditably spent, 
he succeeded in winning the hand of a celebrated beauty. Miss Crad- 
dock, who brought him, besides other chiirms, the sum of £1500. He 
fell heir about the same time to an annuity of £200. The young cou- 
ple retired to an estate in the country, but free living and gayety soon 
exhausted their means, and Fielding returned to London in the hope 
of doing something at the law. He entered upon the duties of the 
profession with great zeal, but violent attacks of the gout, brought on 
by his previous excesses, obliged him to relinquish the practice. 

Origin of his Novels. — In tliis emergency, Fielding tin-ned once more to litera- 
ture, and after sundry attempts, in different lines of composition, he struck at length 
the true vein, and laid bare to the world a mine of heretofore undiscovered wealth in 
the production of his first great noA-el, Joseph Andrews. This was intended prima- 
rily as a satire on Richardson's Pamela, and met with a prodigious success. It was 
followed by Tom Jones, a work of still greater power, and the most consummate in 
plot of all his works. Ilis third great novel, Amelia, came soon after, and. though 
generally rated not quite so high as either of the others, had an immediate success 
superior to either. 

Character as a Wagistrate. — Besides his literary success. Fielding received 
from the Government an appointment as Justice of the Peace for the County of Mid- 
dlesex, and by the vigor of his administration, aided by his knowledge of law and his 
native insight into criminal chai-acter, he did important service iu repressing the 
robberies and crimes of various kinds which were then rampant. 

lAterary Character, — Fielding did a good many other things, and wrote many 
other works, among them no less than twenty-five Comedies; but the three great 
Novels wliich have been mentioned so far overtop all else that he did or wrote, that it 
scarcely deserves to be mentioned iu the comparison. As an artist, in the delineation 
of human natui-e, it is conceded on all hands that Fielding has never been surpassed 
by any writer of English fiction. Yet there is a coarseness in his scenes, and often iu 
his language, that makes a sad drawback to the pleasure of reading him. 

"Fielding is the first of the British Novelists. His name is immortal as a painter 
of national manners. Of all the works of imagination to which English genius has 
given origin, his writings are most decidedly her own ; all the actors in his naiTative 
live in England, travel in England, quarrel and fight in England ; and scarce an inci- 
dent occurs without its being marked by something which could not well have hap- 
pened in any other country. In his power of strong and natural humor, and forcible 



298 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

yet natural expression of character, tlie Father of the English Novel has not been 
approached even by his most successful followers. He is, indeed, as Byron terms him, 
' The prose Homer of human nature.' " — Sir Walter Scott. 

" Fielding, no doubt, began to write this novel [Joseph Andrews] in ridicule of 
Pamela, for which work one can understand the hearty contempt and antipathy which 
such an athletic and boisterous genius as Fielding's must have entertained. He could 
not do otherwise than laugh at the puny cockney bookseller, pouring out endless vol- 
umes of sentimental twaddle, and hold him iip to scorn as a moll-coddle and a 
milksop. His genius had been nursed on sack-posset, and not on dishes of tea. His 
muse had sung the loudest in tavern choruses ; had seen the daylight streaming in 
over thousands of emptied bowls, and reeled home to chambers on the shoulders of 
the watchmen. Richardson's goddess was attended by old maids and dowagers, and 
fed on muffins and bohea. ' Milksop ! ' roars Harry Fielding, clattering at the timid 
shop-shutters. ' Wretch ! Monster ! Mohock ! ' shrieks tlie sentimental author of Pa- 
mela, and all the ladies of his coui-t cackle out an affrighted chorus." — Thackeray. 

"In Tom Jones, Fielding has comprehended a larger variety of incidents and char- 
acters under a stricter unity of story than in Joseph Andrews ; but he has given to 
the whole a tone of worldliness which does not mar the delightful simplicity of the 
latter. As an expression of the breadth and power of his mind, however, it is alto- 
gether his greatest work ; and in tlie union of distinct pictorial representation with 
profound knowledge of practical life, it is unequalled by any novel in the language." 
— Whipple. 

Sarah Fieldixg, 1714-1768, a sister of the novelist, was a woman of learning, and a 
contributor to the literature of her day. She wrote The Adventures of David Simple ; 
Familiar Letters between the Characters in David Simple ; The Governess, or Little 
Female Academy; The Lives of Cleopatra and Octavia; The History of Ophelia; The 
History of the Countess of Delwin ; The Cry, a Domestic Fable, sometimes attributed 
to Patty Fielding ; Xenophon's Memoirs of Socrates, translated from the Greek. 

Smollett. 

Tobias George Smollett, 1721-1771, is permanently asso- 
ciated in fame with Richardson and Fielding. His three 
novels, Roderick Random, Peregrine Pickle, and Humphrey 
Clinker, if not equal to the three great novels of Fielding, 
are superior to the three of Richardson, and occupy a pro- 
minent place in the literature of the age. 

Early Life. — Smollett was a native of Scotland. He studied at Dum- 
barton and Glasgow, and entered the navy as surgeon's mate, and took 
part in the Carthagena expedition. After residing some time in the 
West Indies, where he married, he settled in London, in 1746. 

Literary Career, — In 1748 appeared Eoderick Eandom, in which the 
author embodied many of his experiences in the navy. In 1751 ap- 
peared Peregrine Pickle. After the publication of these two works, 
Smollett attempted to resume the j^ractice of medicme, and published 



THE NOVELISTS. 2S9 

a pamphlet on the use of Medical "Waters, but did not meet with suc- 
cess. In 1753 he published The Adventures of Ferdinand Count 
Fathom; in 1755 his Translation of Don Quixote, based upon that of 
Jarvis, and in 1757-8 his History of England. The Adventures of 
Sir Launcelot Greaves, in imitation of Don Quixote, appeared in 
1762. His Translation of Gil Bias ajjpeared in 1771 ; in 1771, the 
year of his death, appeared also Humphrey Clinker. Besides these 
larger works, Smollett published a few plays, only one of which, 
The Eeprisals, was successful, and two volumes of Travels through 
France and Italy. His History and Adventures of an Atom, published 
in 1769, was a satire upon the Government. Smollett was editor of 
The Critical Review, and also started The Briton, a Tory organ, which 
was crushed by John Wilkes's North Briton. 

Cliftracter. — Smollett was in-yolved in several literarj' and other quarrels, and 
was imprisoned for three months for a libel on Admiral Knowles. Smollett appears 
to have been a man of warm and generous feelings, but easily provoked, and not over 
tolerant of contradiction. He never courted the favor of the rich and great, but 
worked and fought his way through life in perfect independence. He is perma- 
nently associated with Fielding and Richardson as one of the trio of great English 
novelists of the eighteenth century, and like them he has the merits and the vices of 
the age. 

Novels. — Smollett's writings are even more licentious than those of Fielding. In 
judging the novelist, however, it should be kept in mind that he merely reflects the 
spirit of the age. The gentlemen and ladies of those days indulged in actions and 
language which would not be tolerated in the present century. If we would blame 
Smollett for writing of intrigues and amours, we have only to remember that a lady 
of quality, Lady Vane, paid him for the record of her deeds. It seems quite certain, 
at least, that the works of Smollett, Fielding and Richardson were no worse than 
their readers, but probably much better, and that their general iniiuence upon those 
readers was wholesome, \rhether the readers of to-day would be benefited by their 
perusal is quite another question. 

TAterary Merits, — Smollett, like Fielding, is a vigorous and skilful depicter of 
life and character. He has not Fielding's profound insight into human nature, but he 
has an equal eye with Fielding for the vagaries and vicissitudes of society, and as 
nimble a pen to record them. His plots are not so elaborate as Fielding's, and his 
style is by no means so sustained. But Smollett delights without wearying. He is a 
fascinating story-teller. The characters of Peregrine Pickle, Roderick Random, 
Strap, and many others, have been placed in the great English gallery of character- 
pieces. 

" The novel of Humphrey Clinker is, I do think, the nmst laughable story that has 
ever been written since tlie goodly art of novel-writing began. Winifred Jenkins and 
Tabitha Bramble must keep Englishmen on the grin for ages to come: and in their let- 
ters and the story of their lives there is a perpetual fount of sparkling laughter as in- 
exhaustible as Bladud's Well." — Tliachiray. 

Smollett is also the author of several poems which, in the opinion, of Campbell,, 
possess more delicacy than his novels, but have less strength. 



300 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Sterne. 

Laurence Sterne, 1713-1768, is celebrated as a humorist 
and sentimentalist. His two chief works, Tristram Shandy 
and The Sentimental Journey, are among the best known 
of all the works of this period. 

Early Life. — Sterne was born in Ireland, of parents who had just 
emigrated to that country from Scotland. His father was lieutenant in 
the army. Young Sterne was put to school at Halifax, and afterwards 
sent to Oxford, where he took his degree of B. A. in 1736. He entered 
the Church of England, and obtained the living of Sutton, in York- 
shire, where he passed twenty years in rural obscurity. He had to 
preach on Sunday, but the rest of the week was spent in " reading, 
painting, fiddling, and shooting." 

Works. — In 1759 appeared the first two volumes of Tristram Shandy, 
and Sterne had become famous. He was the literary lion of London. 
Henceforth his parish was quite neglected, and he spent nearly all his 
time in London or on the continent, leading a life of idleness and 
gayety and even of dissipation. Tristram Shandy was not completed 
until the year before the author's death. The Sentimental Journey 
appeared about the beginning of 1768. Sterne had also published in 
the meanwhile four volumes of sermons. He died at his lodgings in 
London, comparatively deserted by his numerous admirers. 

Character as a Writer. — There are not many similar instances in English 
lite;atiu-e of a man's becoaaii)g so suddenly and so generally famous by his first vvoik 
of fiction. Everybody laughed and wept alternately over the wit and pathos of the 
new author, and the modest closed their eyes to the licentiousness that disfigured the 
pages. Many generations have come and gone since then, and sentimentalism is long 
since out of favor, but Old Shandy, Uncle Toby, and Trim have become standard names 
in English literature. Sterne has been accused and convicted, again and again, of 
having stolen from Rabelais, Montaigne, Scarron, Bacon, Donne, and the entire body 
of French and English authors ; his style has been shown to be borrowed, his sentiment 
weak and thin, his wit affected. Yet somehow he still survives, he is still read and 
enjoyed by each successive generation of readers, and no one of his judges has ever yet 
succeeded in showing satisfactorily how an author, who stole every idea, and had no 
positive merit of his own, has nevertheless succeeded in holding his ground against all 
criticism and anathema. The truth is that St'^rne was a prodigious reader, but had the 
happy gift of recreating his gathered materials into entirely new forms. There never 
was anything like Tristram Shandy before in English letters, and there certainly has 
been nothing since. 

" TIis style is at times the most rapid, the most happy, the most idiomatic, of any 
that is to be found. It is the pure essence of English conversational style. His works 
consist only of mnrceaux, — of brilliant passages. I wonder that Goldsmith, who ought 
to have known him better, should call him a 'dull fellow.' His wit is poignant though 



THE POETS. 301 



artificial ; and his characters (though the groundwork of some of them had been laid 
before) have yet invaluable original differences; and the spirit of the execution, the 
master-strokes constantly thrown into them, are not to be surpassed. It is sufficient 
to name them : — Yorick, Dr. Slop, Mr. Shandy, My Uncle Toby, Trim, Susanna, and 
the Widow Wadman. In these he has contrived to oppose, with equal felicity and 
originality, two characters, one of pure intellect and the other of pure good nature, 
in My Father and My Uncle Toby. There appears to have been in Sterne a vein of 
dry, sarcastic hunior; and of extreme tenderness of feeling ; the latter sometimes car- 
ried to affectation, as in the tale of Maria, and the apostrophe to the recording angel, 
but at other times pure and without blemish. The story of Le Fevre is perhaps the 
finest in the English language. My Father's restlessness of body and of mind Is inimi- 
table. . . . My Uncle Toby is one of the finest compliments ever paid to human 
nature. He is the most unoffending of human creatures ; or, as the French express 
it, un tel petit bon homme. Of his bowling green, his sieges, and his amours, who 
would say or think anything amiss." — Hazl'dt. 



III. THE POETS. 

Goldsmith. 

Oliver Goldsmith, 1728-1774, is one of the most conspic- 
uous ornaments of the period now under consideration. He 
excelled about equally in poetry and prose. Of the vast 
mass of his prose writings, however, the greater part has 
ceased to be of interest. The only one, in fact, that is now 
generally read is The Vicar of Wakefield. But his poems, 
though inconsiderable in amount, have a perpetual charm. 
There are, indeed, few poems in the language that have a 
better prospect of a permanent place in its literature than 
The Deserted Village. 

Early Life. — Goldsmith was a native of Ireland, the son of a cler- 
gyman of the Established Church. In boyhood he had the small-pox, 
by which his face was permanently disfigured. At the age of seven- 
teen, through the liberality of a kind-hearted uncle, he entered Trinity 
College, Dublin. Here he gained few distinctions, his habits of study, 
like all his other habits, being wrecked by improvidence. On one oc- 
casion, however, he won a small prize, of the value of thirty shillings : 
" This turn of success and sudden influx of wealth proved too much 
for the head of our poor student. He forthwith gave a supper and 
dance at his chamber, to a number of young persons of both sexes from 
the city, in direct violation of college rules. The unwonted sound of 
the fiddle reached the ears of the implacable Wilder [the tutor]. He 
rushed to the scene of unhallowed festivity, inflicted corporal chastise- 
26 



302 dPv.joh:n-son and his con temporaries. 

ment on the ^father of the feast/ and turned his astonished guests 
neck and heels out of doors." — Irving. Mortified at this indignity. 
Goldsmith left College, but lingered in Dublin until reduced to the ex- 
tremity of destitution. His last shilling and most of his clothing gone, 
hungry and half naked, he set out for Cork, and on the way was saved 
from actual starvation by a handful of gray peas given him at a wake 
by a kind-hearted peasant girl. He declared afterwards, when in the 
height of his renown, and revelling at the luxurious banquets of the 
great, that he had never tasted anything equal to those gray peas. 

Various Other Experiments. — By the kind interposition of his 
brother, Oliver was reinstated in College, and remained there two years 
longer, at the end of which time he managed to take his degree. 
By the persuasion of his uncle, he began studying for the church, and 
at the end of two years presented himself to the Bishop for examina- 
tion, "but appearing in a pair of scarlet breeches, he was rejected." The 
Bishop probably had an intimation that the indiscretions of the candi- 
date extended to other things than the color of his breeches. The per- 
severing benefactor, his uncle, then procured him a position as private 
tutor, but Oliver quarrelled with one of the family over a game of 
cards, and lost his position. He had, however, at the time of his dis- 
missal, thirty pounds in cash, which seemed to him a mint of money. 
But in the course of six weeks he squandered it all, and returned to 
his mother without a shilling in his pocket. Once more the patient 
uncle conceived that the young spendthrift might perhaps succeed at 
the law, and supplied him accordingly with fifty pounds, wherewith 
to make a beginning. The fifty pounds were spent at the gaming-table, 
and Goldsmith was again at the verge of ruin. The next experiment 
of Oliver's friends was to set him up as a Doctor of Medicine. They 
put together what few guineas they could spare, and sent him to Edin- 
burgh, flere he did not entirely throw away his time, but attended 
some lectures during the eighteen months of his residence. He 
could, however, tell a good story and sing a capital Irish song, and he 
shone accordingly in social circles more than in the halls of science. 

Travels. — A roving disposition impelled him to travel, and he is 
■ next found on the continent, sometimes at seats of learning, picking up 
scraps of knowledge at the lectures of great scholars, but more fre- 
quently travelling through the country on foot, and getting his meals 
and lodgings by making himself agreeable to the peasants with his 
musical abilities and his other skill in the arts of entertainment. 
When he left Leyden for the purpose of making a journey through 
Europe, his finances, wardrobe, and furniture a,raounted to '' a guinea 



THE POETS. 60o 

in his pocket, a shirt on his back, and a flute in his hand." During 
this nomad life, he took his degree of Doctor of Medicine at one of 
the foreign Universities. 

Career as an Author. — Returning to England in 1756, at the age of 
twenty-eight. Goldsmith made his way to London, only to meet starva- 
tion in the face. For the next two or three years his struggles for the 
means of bare subsistence were extreme. He did all kinds of book 
work for the publishers, — whatever would bring a few pounds or even 
shillings. His first work of any note was An Inquiry into the Present 
State of Polite Learning in Europe. It was savagely attacked by one of 
the critics, but it made the author known, and on the whole was well 
received. In 1760, he wrote for a popular periodical a series of letters 
purporting to come from a Chinese philosopher living in London, and 
giving his countrymen an account of what he was seeing there. These 
are known as The Chinese Letters. They were collected and published 
in a book with the title ; The Citizen of the World, or Letters from 
a Chinese Philosopher residing in London to liis friends in the East. 
The work displayed unusual ability, and brought the author offers of 
employment of a somewhat more lucrative kind. The first decided lift 
that he received, however, was his making the acquaintance of Dr. 
Johnson. Johnson took to Goldsmith almost from the first of their 
acquaintance, and he never faltered in the friendship which was the 
result. The occasions of Goldsmith's needing help were seldom long 
wanting. One of these led to Johnson's interposition for the sale of the 
manuscript of The Vicar of Wakefield. The incident is thus told by 
Johnson himself: 

"I received one morning a message from poor Goldsmith that he was in great dis- 
tress, and as it was not in his power to come to me, begged that I would come to him 
as soon as possible. I sent him a guinea, and promised to come to him directly. I 
accordingly went as soon as I was dressed, and found that his landlady had arrested 
him for his rent, at which he was in a violent passion. I perceived that he had already 
changed my guinea, and had got a bottle of Madeira and a glass before him. I put 
the cork into the bottle, desired he would be calm, and began to talk to him of the 
means whereby he might be extricated. He then told me he had a novel ready for 
the press, which he produced to me. I looked into it, and saw its merit ; told the land- 
lady I should soon return ; and, having gone to a bookseller, sold it for sixty pounds. 
I brought Goldsmith the money, and he discharged his rent, not without rating his 
landlady in a high tone for having used him so ill." — BoswelVs Johnson. 

The Traveller, his first considerable poem, followed soon after. Not- 
withstanding its extraordinary merits, and the zealous efforts of John- 
son to bring it into notice, it won its way to public favor by only slow 
degrees. Its success, however, was steady and sure, and in the end 



304 DK. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

triumphant. The exquisite ballad of The Hermit, or the story of Ed- 
win and Angelina, confirmed his reputation as a poet of the first order 
of excellence. 

After this, Goldsmith was in constant demand, at remunerative 
prices, but his habits of easy improvidence kept him always in want, 
or in arrears. He was among the acknowledged celebrities of the day, 
mingling freely and on equal terms with the authors and artists who 
revolved about Dr. Johnson. 

The following are Goldsmith's principal works, in addition to those 
already named : The Deserted Village, the most beautiful of all his 
poems; The Haunch of Venison, a playful piece of pleasantry, ac- 
knowledging, in graceful verse, a gift of venison ; Retaliation, a good- 
natured satire, in which he paid off a few of the endless jokes against 
himself by drawing in turn a caricature of some of his friends ; The 
Good-Xatured Man, A Comedy, which was not successful as an acting 
play, but was published, and brought the author £500 ; She Stoops to 
Conquer, a Comedy, which had an immediate and brilliant success on 
the stage, and brought the author a net profit of £800 ; Popular His- 
tories of Greece, Eome, and England ; and lastly, A History of Ani- 
mated Nature, in 8 vols., 8vo. He wrote many other things, but these 
are the chief. As an historian and a writer on natural history, he made 
no pretence to original research. He was a mere compiler. But he 
had a wonderful skill in the art of composition ; and taking the ma- 
terials collected by others, he worked them into forms of grace and 
beauty. His histories became text-books, his Animated Xature had 
the attraction of a work of fiction. 

" He died in the midst of a triumphant course. Every year that he lived would have 
added to his reputation. There is assuredly no symptom of decadence in the pictur- 
esque pages of his last work, The History of Animated Nature : a book which, not 
possessing, indeed, the character of authority only to be granted to faithful reports 
of personal observation, is yet unequalled for clearness of expression, and all the 
charms of a most graceful style. Nortlicote tells us that he had just begim a novel 
before his death : and a second Vicar of Wakefield may have been buried in the tomb 
of Goldsmith."— Prof. Butler. 

"It [The Animated Nature] is to science what his abridgments are to history: a 
book which indicates no deptli of research or accuracy of information, but which pre- 
sents to the ordinary reader a general and interesting view of the STibject, couched 
in the clearest and most beautiful language, and abounding with excellent reflections 
and illustrations. It was of this work that Johnson threw out the remark which he 
afterwards interwove in his friend's epitaph, — He is now writing a Natural History, 
and will make it as agreeable as a Persian tale." — Sir Walter Scott. 

" As a dramatist, Goldsmith is amusing ; and if to excite laughter be, as Johnson 
asserts it is, the chief end of comedy. Goldsmith attains it. His plots, however, are ex- 
travagant, and his personages are oddities rather than characters. Goldsmith's plays 
want the contrivance which belongs to highest art ; but they have all the ingenious 



THE POETS. 305 

accidents that are notable for stage effect. They are, in fact, deficient in that insight 
-which pertains only to great dramatic genius. Both of them [The Good-Xatured 
Man and She Stoops to Conquer] abound in drollery and strong touches of nature ; 
but they do not give the author an exalted position among dramatists, and they do not 
promise that he could have reached it." — Henry Giles. 

" It is needless to expatiate upon tlie qualities of a work [The Ticar of Wakefield] 
which has passed from country to country, and language to language, until it is now 
known throughout the whole reading world, and is become a household book in every 
land. The secret of its universal and enduring popularity is undoubtedly its truth 
to nature, but to nature of the most amiable kind : to nature such as Goldsmith saw- 
it. Rogers, the Nestor of British literature, whose refined purity of taste and exquis- 
ite menttvl organization rendered him eminently calculated to appreciate a work of 
the kind, declared that of all the books which, through the fitful changes of three 
generations he had seen rise and fall, the charm of the Yicar of Wakefield had alone 
continued as at first; and could he revisit the world after an absence of many more 
generations, he should as surely look to find it undiminished." — Washington Irving. 

" The Traveller has the most ambitious aim of Goldsmith's poetical compositions. 
The author, placed on a height of the Alps, muses and moralizes on the countries 
around him. His object, it appears, is to show the equality of happiness which con- 
sists with diversities of circumstances and situations. The poem is, therefore, mainly 
didactic. Description and reflection are subservient to an ethical purpose, and this 
purpose is never left out of sight. The descriptive passages are all vivid, but some 
of them are imperfect. Italy, for instance, in its prominent aspects, is boldly sketched. 
We are tramsported to the midst of its mountains, woods, and temples ; we are under 
its sunny skies, we are embosomed in its fruits and flowers, we breathe its fra- 
grant air, and we are charmed by its matchless landscapes ; but we miss the influence 
of its arts, and the solemn impression of its former gi^andeur. We are made to sur- 
vey a nation in degeneracy and decay ; but we are not relieved by the glow of Eaffael, 
or excited by the might of the Coliseum." — Henry Giles. 

" All the characteristics of the first poem [The Traveller] seem to me developed in 
the second; with as chaste simplicity, with as choice selectness of natural expression, 
in verse of as musical cadence, but with yet greater earnestness of purpose, and a far 
more human interest. Within the circle of its claims and pretensions, a more en- 
tirely' satisfactory delightful poem than the Deserted Tillage was probably never 
-written. It lingers in the memory where once it has entered ; and such is the soften- 
ing influence (on the heart even more than the understanding) of the mild, ten- 
der, yet clear light which makes its images so distinct and lovely, that there are 
few who have not wished to rate it higher than poetry of yet higher genius." — 
John Forster. 

Gray. 

Thomas Gray, 1716-1771, gained for himself the veiy 
highest renown as a lyrical poet by his Elegy Written in a 
Country Churchyard. 

Career. — Gray was born in London, and educated at Cambridge. 

He began the study of law, but conceiving a di.'ilike for it accepted an 

invitation of Horace Walpole to accompany him on a tour upon the 

continent. After an absence of two years, Gray returned to England, 

26^ U 



306 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTE M PO R A EI ES . 

and at the age of twenty-five took liis degree of Bachelor of Civil Law. 
He also settled in Cambridge, where he remained, with occasional in- 
tervals, to the end of his life. In 1757, on the death of Gibbon, tlie 
post of Poet-Laureate was offered to Gray, but he declined it. In 
1769 he received the appointment of Professor of Modern HL>tory, 
and he began the preparation of a course of lectures on the subject, 
but did not live to carry the project into effect. 

Character and Standing. — Gray was distinguished for the accuracy of his clas- 
sical scholarship, and for his varied learning, and he formed many magnificent projects 
of works that never saw the light. His chief excellence is as a lyric writer, and in 
this line he stands among the first. The Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard is 
one of the poems of all time, and is just as sure of immortality as anything written 
by Horace or by Pindar. One familiar and remarkable tribute to the merit of this 
poem is the great number of translations of it which have been made into the various 
languages of Europe, ancient and modern. It has been translated into Hebrew, the 
words and phrases being taken, as far as possible, from the classical idioms of the Old 
Testament; into Greel-, 7 different versions; into Latin, 12 versions: into Italian, 12 
versions ; into French, 15 versions ; into German, 6 versions ; into Portuguese. 

His Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College is only second to the Elegj' in popu- 
larity. His other lyrical pieces are the following: Ode on Spring; Hymn to Adversity; 
Ode to Vicissitude ; The Progress of Poesy, a Pindaric Ode ; The Bard, a Pindaric Ode. 
The Pindaric Odes have less of the elements of popularity' than any of his poems. 

An amusing evidence of the popularity of his best poem is proved in what happened 
at the sale of the original manuscript, in 1845. "The original manuscript of Gray's 
Elegy was lately sold at auction in London. There was really 'a scene" in the auc- 
tion-room. Imagine a stranger entering in the midst of a sale of some rusty-looking 
old books. The auctioneer produces two small half-sheets of paper, written over, torn, 
and mutilated. He calls it ' a most interesting article,' and apologizes for its condi- 
tion. Pickering bids ten pounds I Rodd, Poss, Thorpe, Bohn, Holloway, and some few 
amateurs quietly remark, twelve, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty, and so on, till 
there is a pause at sixty-three pounds! The hammer strikes. 'Hold! ' says Mr. Foss. 
'It is mine,' says the amateur. ' No, I bid sixty-five in time.' ' Then I bid seventy.' 
' Sevent3'-five,' says Mr. Foss ; and fives are repeated again, until the two bits of paper 
are knocked down, amidst a general cheer, to Payne & Foss, for one hundred pounds 
sterling! On these bits of paper are written the first drafts of the Elegy in a Country 
Churchyard, by Thomas Gray, including five verses which were omitted in the publi- 
cation, and with the poet's interlinear corrections and alterations, — certainly an 'in- 
teresting article ; ' several persons supposed it would call for a ten-pound note, perhaps 
even twenty. A single volume, with ' W. Shakespeare' in the fly-leaf, produced, sixty 
years ago, a hundred guineas ; but probably, with that exception, no mere autograph, 
and no single sheet of paper, ever produced the sum of Jive hundred dollars." 

Mason. 

William Masoist, 1725-1797, was a minor poet of the last century, 
whose name is indissolubly associated with that of his friend Gray. 

Mason wrote two Dramas on the model of the Greek. Elfrida, and Caractacus ; The 
English Garden, a Poem in Four Books; A number of Odes and Anthems; Essays on 



THE POETS. 307 

English Church Music ; and A Memoir of Thomas Gray. His "Works have been 
printed in i vols., 8vo. His drumas sliow much fancy and a fine classical taste, but 
are entii-ely unsuited for representation. His greatest success was in his lyrical pieces. 

Matthew Geeex, 1697-1737, is a poet of some celebrity, whose poems are usually 
printed with tliose of Parnell, Collins, Gray, and others. He was an oflQcer in the 
London Custom-House, and was noted for his wit. He wrote The Grotto, The Spleen, 
and some other pieces. 

Rev. John Dyer, 1700-1758, began the study of law, abandoned the profession for 
the life of an itinerant artist, and afterwards took orders and entered the church. He 
had a literary turn, and wrote several poems which are worthy of note : Grongar Hill ; 
The Ruins of Rome ; The Fleece, a poem in four books, etc. Grongar Hill is considered 
the best. "It is not indeed very accurately written ; but the scenes which it displays 
are so pleasing, the images which they raise are so welcome to the mind, and the re- 
flections of the writer so consonant to the general sense or experience of mankind, 
that when it is once read it will be read again." — Br. Johnson. 

Collins. 

William Collins, 1720-1756, is one of the greatest of 
English lyric poets. What he has written is not much in 
amount, but that little is of the highest order of excellence. 
Some of his odes are thought to come as near absolute per- 
fection as anything ever written. 

CoUins's life was a sad one. His Odes, when first published, were 
received with cold neglect, and the publisher lo.st heavily bv the opera- 
tion. Receiving afterwards a legacy from an uncle, Collins repaid the 
publisher for the money lost in the transaction, and then threw the 
remaining copies of his book into the fire. Finding his mind un- 
steady, he travelled in France, for the purpose of diversion. On com- 
ing back to England, he retired to an asylum for the insane, and thence 
to the house of his sister, where he died at the early age of thirty-six. 
He published some Persian Eclogues, but the only works by which he 
is now known are his Odes. These are among the best English classics. 
The Ode on the Passions will doubtless live as long as the language 
itself in which the poem is written. 

"Though utterly neglected on their first appearance, the Odes of Collins, in the 
course of one generation, without any iidventitious aid to bring them into notice, were 
acknowledged to be the best of their kind in the language. Silently and impercep- 
tibly they had risen by their own buoyancy ; and their power was felt by every reader 
who had any poetic feeling." — Southey. 



308 BR.JOU^sSON AXB HIS COXTE M FOR ARIES . 



Shenstone. 

William Shexstoxe, 1714-1763, is favorably known by his poem, 
The Schoohnistress, written in the Spenserian measure. 

Shenstone studied for a number of years at Oxford without taking a degree. The 
last twenty years of his life were devoted to laying out and improving his estate, Tl;e 
Leasowes, in Shropshire. Shenstone belongs to the minor poets of England. Ilad he 
been forced to exertion, he might have produced something more worthy of his pow- 
ers, but he seems to have frittered away his days as a literary idler. The only one of 
his poems generally read and admired is The Schoolmistress, pronounced by HazHtt 
"a perfect piece of writing."' The Pastoral Ballad and Jemmy Dawson are also good. 

Akenside. 

Mark Akenside, M. D., 1721-1770, had considerable eminence in 
his day as a medical practitioner and a writer on medical science. But 
his chief distinction was won by a poem on The Pleasures of the Im- 
agination, first published in 1744. 

This one production has given to Akenside a permanent and honorable place in the 
gallery of British poets. The work shows learning and genius, though not of the 
highest order, and is obviously wanting in naturalness. "The sweetness which we 
miss in Akenside is that which should arise from the direct representation of life and 
its warm realities and affections. We seem to pass, in his poems, through a gallery 
of pictured abstractions, rather than of pictured things." — Campbell. His Odes and 
olher writings have passed into merited oblivion. 

Churchill. 

Charles CHrBCHiLL, 1731-1764, was in his day a poet of great 
celebrity. 

Career. — Through the mistaken advice of his father, Churchill entered the clerical 
profession ; but finding its duties distasteful, he abandoned it, and became openly im- 
moral and profligate. He had great talents, and his writings show marks of genius, 
but not enough to account for the extraordinary favor with which they were re- 
ceived. Much of this temporary success was no doubt due to the fact that his poems 
for the most part were bitterly personal. He was the intimate friend of the no- 
torious demagogue, John Wilkes, and mixed up politics and scandal among the in- 
gredients of the cup which he offered to the public. 

Worlis. — The Rosciad, his earliest publication, was a satire upoi^ the performers 
at Drury Lane and Covent Garden, and met with instant success. Being severely 
taken to task for it by the critics, he turned upon his reviewers, as Byron did at a 
later day, and wrote his Apology. The Prophecy of Famine, a Scots Pastoral, was 
written at the suggestion of Wilkes, and was a bitter invective against the Scottish 
nation. Hogarth, who disliked Churchill, caricatured him in his usual style, by paint- 
ing him as a bear dressed up canonically, with ruffles at his paws, and holding a pot 
of porter. Churchill took his revenge in a fierce and sweeping Epistle to Hogarth. 
He published a volume of his Sermons, to which he prefixed a satirical dedication to 
Warburton, addressing that dignitary as '• Doctor, Dean, Bishop, Gloster, My Lord." 



THE POETS. 309 

Some of his other pieces are The Ghost ; The Conference, a Poem ; The Conclave ; The 
Bard, etc. 

"Churchill, as a satirist, may be ranked immediately after Pope and Dryden, with 
perhaps a greater share of humor than either. He has tlie bitterness of Pope, with 
less wit to atone for it, but no mean share of the fine manner and energetic plain- 
ness of Dryden." — Thomas Campbell. 

" No English poet ever enjoyed so excessive and so short-lived a popularity." — 
Southey. 

Churchill boasted that he wrote in hot haste, taking no time to plan or prune : 
•' Had I the power, I could not have the time, 
While spirits flow, and life is in her prime, 
"Without a sin 'gainst pleasure, to design 
A plan, to methodize each thought, each line 
Highly to finish, and make every grace 
In itself charming, take new charms from place. 
Notliing of books, and little known of men, 
When the mad fit comes on I seize the pen ; 
Rough as they run, the rapid thoughts set down, 
Rough as they run, discharge them on the town." 

Allan Ramsay. 

Allan Eamsay, 1685-1758, was a Scotch poet of some note. His 
poem, The Gentle Shepherd, has been a general favorite. 

Ramsay was originally a wig-maker ; subsequently he became a bookseller, having 
removed from Lanarkshire to Edinburgh. Besides publishing the works of others, 
he gave to the world several of his own, almost exclusively poetical. They are 
written in the Scotch dialect. Ramsay is, in a sense, the predecessor of Burns and 
the coadjutor of Percy. His poems, being favorably received in England, familiar- 
ized the English public to the dialect north of the Tweed, while his collection of 
ancient ballads kept alive a love for popular poetry, afterwards so powerfully stimu- 
lated by the appearance of the Reliques. The best known of Ramsay's works are his 
Tea-Table Miscellany, a collection of English and Scotch songs, and the Gentle Shep- 
herd, a Pastoral Comedy, 

"Ramsay had not the force of Burns ; but neither, in just proportion to his merits, 
is he likely to be felt by an English reader. The fire of Burns's wit and passion glows 
through an obscure dialect by confinement to short and concentrated bursts. The 
interest which Kamsay excites is spread over a long poem, delineating manners more 
than passions; and the mind must be at home both in the language and manners to 
appreciate the skill and comic archne.ss with which he has heightened the display of 
rustic character without giving it vulgarity, and refined the views of peasant life by 
situations of sweetness and tenderness without in the least departing from its sim- 
plicity. Like the poetry of Tasso and Ariosto, that of the Gentle Shephenl is en- 
graven on the memory of its native country. Its verses have passed into proverbs, 
and it continues to be the delight and solace of the peasantry whom it describes." — 
CampheU 

Atux Ramsay, Jr., 1713-1784; a son of Allan Ramsay, was celebrated in his day 
as a painter. He published several pamphlets on political subjects, which are no 



310 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

longer of importance. Ramsay enjoyed the reputation of being a very entertaining 
conversationist. 

Young. 

Edward Young, 1684-1765, author of "The Night 
Thoughts," holds no inconsiderable place in English litera- 
ture. 

Career. — Young was the son of an English clergyman. He was 
educated at Winchester and at Oxford. He held a Law Fellowship at 
Oxford, and took the degree of D. C. L. there in 1719. Having a 
promise of preferment in the church, he took holy orders in 1727, but 
never rose higher than a country rectory in Hertfordshire. In 1731, 
he was married to Lady Elizabeth Lee, widow of Col. Lee, and daugh- 
ter of the Earl of Lichfield. The poet's step-daughter. Miss Lee, was 
married to Mr. Temple, son of Lord Palmerston. Mr, and Mrs. Tem- 
ple are supposed to be the Philander and Narcissa of The Night 
Thoughts. 

Wm'ks. — Dr. Young is almost exclusively known by the one work already named. 
He wrote, however, many others. The following are the titles of a few : The Uuiversal 
Passion, love of fame, a series of seven satires ; The Force of Religion, founded on the 
death of Lady Jane Grey; two Tragedies, Busiris King of Egypt, and Revenge; A 
Poem on the Last Day ; A Vindication of Providence, etc. 

" Young's Night Thoughts " was once almost as common a book as 
Pilgrim's Progress, and as generally read. It is still one of the most 
popular works in the language, although open to obvious and just criti- 
cism. 

" The 'Night Thoughts' certainly contains many splendid and happy conceptions, but 
their beauty is thickly marred by false wit and over-labored antithesis; indeed, his 
whole ideas seem to have been in a state of antithesis while he composed the poem. 
One portion of his fancy appears devoted to aggravate the picture of his desolate feel- 
ings, and the other half to contradict that picture by eccentric images and epigram- 
matic ingenuities. As a poet, he was fond of exaggeration, but it was that of the fancy 
more than that of the heart. There is nothing of entertaining succession of parts in 
the ' Night Thoughts.' The poem excites no anticipation as it proceeds. One book 
bespeaks no impatience for another, nor is found to have laid the smallest foundation 
for new pleasure when the succeeding night sets in. The poet's fancy discharges itself 
on the mind in short ictuses of surprise, which rather lose than increase their forc^ by 
reiteration ; but he is remarkably defective in progressive interest and collective effect. 
The power of the poem, instead of being in the whole, lies in short, vivid, and broken 
gleams of genius ; so that, if we disregard parti<'ular lines, we shall but too often miss 
the only gems of ransom which the poet can bring as the price of his relief from sur- 
rounding tedium." — Campbell: Essay on English Pnetry. 

"Young is too often fantastical and frivolous; he pins butterflies to the pulpit- 
cushion; he suspends against the grating of the charnel-house colored lamps and 



THE POETS. 311 

comic transparencies, — Cupid, and the cat and the fiddle ; he opens a storehouse filled 
with minute particles of heterogeneous wisdom and unpalatable gobbets of ill-con- 
cocted learning, contributions from the classics, from the schoolmen, from homilies, 
and from farces. What you expected to be an elegy turns out an epigram ; and when 
you think he is bursting into tears he laughs in your face. Do you go with him into 
his closet, prepared for an admonition or a rebuke, he shakes his head, and you sneeze 
at the powder and perfumery of his peruke. "Wonder not if I prefer to his pungent 
essences the incense which Cowper burns before the altar." — W. S.Landor: Iiruiginary 
Conversations. 

John Byrom, 1691-1763, was a remarkable character and 
a very interesting author. 

Career. — A Student and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, he 
made his mark in 1714 by the pastoral " Colin and Phoebe," which ap- 
peared in The Spectator. He studied medicine abroad, but never took 
a degree, (" Doctor" by courtesy only,) and in 1724 was made F. E. S. 
He invented a system of shorthand, and for a while supported himself 
by teaching it, having married for love, thereby oifending the lady's 
relatives and his own. Afterwards, inheriting the family estates at 
Kensall, Lancashire, he led the easy life of a country gentleman, and 
amused himself with study and rhyming. 

Cliaracter and Works. — Byrom was a man of blameless character, and a Chris- 
tian philosopher of a high and uncommon type. He admired and largely followed the 
Mj'stics, especially Jacob Behmen; yet luminous and solid common sense appears in 
all his writings Possessed of great wit and rich humor, he is the author of some of 
our best epigrams ; and his poems run through all styles and subjects, "from grave 
to gay, from lively to severe." He wrote verse carelessly and with great fluency, pub- 
lished next to nothing, and was utterly indifferent to reputation ; had he chosen, he 
might have won high poetic rank. As it is, one or two hymns and several lighter pieces 
from his pen are still Mell known : and the fortunate possessor of his somewhat scarce 
"Poems" will find in them much to amuse, to edify, and to instruct. They were col- 
lected after his death, and appeared in two volumes, 1773, and again, revised and en- 
larged, in 181-i. Also his " Literary Remains "' were published for the Cheetham So- 
ciety, in 1857; so permanent has been the impression made on the comparatively few 
who had any adequate knowledge of the man through his writings. They display a 
lively, powerful, penetrating, and well-instructed mind, and a spirit thoroughlj' 
attuned to the love of God and man. One-half his poems are distinctively religious : the 
thought in these belongs rather to our time than to that in which he lived. Often 
free, it is always reverent, and generally sound ; his pages, besides the wholesome fla- 
vor of a genial personality, are informed by an ardent and yet a reasoning faith. 
Among the English authors who have fallen sliort of absolute greatness, there is per- 
haps none who better deserves, or is likely longer to retain, honorable mention and 
kindly remembrance. He is supposed to have coined the word '• bibliolatry," in the 
following couplet: 

" If to adore an image be idolatry, 
To deify a book is bibliolatry." 



312 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Anne Steele, 1716-1778, is one of the sweet singers of 
the church. 

Mrs. Steele was the daughter of a Baptist clergyman, the Eev. Wil- 
liam Steele, of Broughton, Hampsliire. She was never married, but in 
her later years became Mrs. Steele, by one of the beautiful courtesies 
of the olden time. 

Character. — Mrs. Steele was a -woman of a most earnest religious spirit, and was 
very active in deeds of Christian charity. She was a great sutferer, and the trial of 
her patience has left its mark upon her writings. Owing to an accident in childhood 
she was a confirmed invalid, and was often confined to her chamber; a few hours be- 
fore her contemplated wedding, the object of her affections was drowned; her father's 
death gave her a shock from which she never recovered. Yet a spirit of peaceful con- 
tent pervades all she wrote. 

Works. — Mrs. Steele was the author of Poems on Subjects chiefly Devotional, in 3 
vols. The collection includes 144 Hymns, 34 Psalms, and about 60 poems on moral 
subjects. Some of her Hymns are faultless as lyrics, and are familiar in almost every 
household of the Christian faith. 

Falconer. 

WiLiiiAM Falconer, 1730-1769, has a permanent place in English 
literature by his one remarkable poem. The Shipwreck. 

Falconer was the son of a barber in Edinburgh, and went to sea while young. He 
suffi-red shipwreck on two occasions, and both times very narrowly escaped with 
his life. His familiarity with sea life and its dangers, joined to the possession of the 
true poetic faculty, enabled him to give such a picture of shipwreck as no other poet 
has succeeded in giving. He published some other poems, but this was the only one 
that attracted attention. He also compiled A Universal Dictionary of the Marine, 4to, 
which was regarded of great value. In 1769, he sailed for India as purser to the ship 
Aurora, which touched at the Cape of Good Hope, but was never heard of afterward. 
It is supposed to have gone down in the Mozambique Channel. 

John Armstrong, M. D., 1709-1779, was a didactic poet of consid- 
erable repute. 

Armstrong was a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, and attained some celeb- 
rity in his profession as a physician. His chief literary work was a poem on The Art 
of Preserving Health, which was highly praised by Warton, Beattie, and others. War- 
ton says: "To describe so difficult a thing, gracefully and poetically, as the effects of 
distemper on a human body, was reserved for Dr. Armstrong, who accordingly hath 
executed it at the end of his third book, Avhere he hath given us that pathetic account 
of the sweating sickness. There is a classical correctness and closeness of style in this 
poem that ffVe truly admirable, and the subject is raised and adorned by numberless 
poetical images." Armsti'ong's other publications are : A Dialogue between Ilygeia, 
Mercury, and Pluto; Winter; Benevolence, a Poetical Epistle to Eumenes; Taste, an 
Epistle to a Young Critic; and A Short Ramble through France and Italy. He pub- 
lished also a volume of Medical Essays. 



THE POETS. 313 

Christopher Anstet, 1724-1805, is chiefly known as the author of Tlie New Bath 
Guide, 1766. one of the most popular poems of that day. It was a diverting satire 
upon the follies of the time, and is directed chiefly against physicians and Methodists. 
Smollett is said to have borrowed largely from it in the composition of Humphrey 
Clinker. Dodsley, the publisher, said that the proiits on the sale of The New Bath 
Guide were greater than he had ever gained by the publication of any other book in 
the same length of time. It has now fallen almost entirely into oblivion. 

Box>'£LL Thorxton, 1724-1768, a humorous writer of the last century, was educated 
at Westminster School and Oxford. His earliest production was An Ode on St. Ceci- 
lia's Day, a burlesque of the Jews-Harji, Bones, Hurdy-Gurdy, and other national 
English instruments. Thornton also published The Battle of the Wigs, and contrib- 
uted to The Student, and to The Connoisseur. Assisted somewhat by Coleman and 
Warner, he published, in 1767, a translation of the Comedies of Plautus, which is 
still valued by the classical student. 

Hexrt Caret, 1743, George Saville Carey, 1743-1807, father and son. They 

were musical composers and poets of the same order, — writing songs, setting them 
to music, and singing them for public amusement. Their productions were not 
of a high order, or of a kind likely to survive ; but they were very numerous, and they 
contributed largely to the popular amusement ; and it is recorded especially, of both 
these men, that though they dealt much in the comic, they never once transgressed 
the laws of decency. 

'\Yellia:m Whitehead, 1715-1785, Poet-Laureate, was bom at 
Cambridge, son of a baker, and was educated at "Winchester and 
Cambridge. 

Whitehead resided for many years with Lord and Lady Jersey, first as tutor to their 
son, and then as a social companion ; and succeeded Colley Cibber in the Laureateship 
in 1727. Macaulay calls him ''the most accomplished tuft-hunter of his time."' He 
wrote Atys and Adrastus ; Epistle of Anne Boleyn to Henry YIII. ; The Danger of 
Writing in Verse: Essay on Ridicule; Epistle on Nobility; Hymn to the Nymph at 
Bristol Spring; Pathetic Apology for AH Laureats; Yerses to the People of England; 
Tariety, a Tale for Married People ; Goat's Beard ; and the following Plays : The Roman 
Father, Creusa King of Athens, School for Lovers, A Trip to Scotland, (Edipus. 

Paul Whitehead, 1710-1774, was born in Holborn, the son of a tailor, and \vaa ap- 
prenticed to a mercer. He married an heiress, through whom he received £10,000; 
refused to pay £3000, for which he had gone security, and suffered imprisonment 
therefor; became a political satirist, and was appointed to an oflSce in the Treasury 
worth £800 per annum, whicli post he kept till his death. He wrote State Dunces, a 
satire, in imitation of Pope ; Manners, a satire, for which the publishers were fined 
and imprisoned by the House of Lords ; Honor, and The Gymnasiad, Satires, etc. 

David Mallet, 1700-1765, was a native of Scotland. He was educated at Edinburgh 
and Aberdeen, and removed to London, on which occasion he changed his name from 
Malloch to Mallet. He is the author of several poems, ballads, and plays, and of a life 
of Bacon, which is prefi.xed to the works of that author. "As a writer he cannot bo 
placed in any high class. There is no species of composition in which he was eminent. 
Ilis dramas had their day, — a short day, — and are forgotten; his blank verse seemi^ 
to my ear the echo of Thouwoij." — J)r. Johnson, 

27 



314 dr.joh:n^son and his contemporaeies. 

William Wilkie, D. D., 1721-1 772, was a native of Echlin, Scotland, and a graduate 
of the University of Edinburgh. He tried his liaud for a time at farming ; afterwards 
became a minister; finally, Professor of Natural Philosophy in the University of 
Glasgow. He had in his day considerable reputation as a poet, and was known among 
his friends as " The Scottish Homer." His chief poem was The Epigoniad, a poem iu 
nine Books, in the manner of Spenser. It is now little known. 

Andrew McDonald, 1757-1790, son of a gardener of Leith, was educated at the Uni- 
versity of Edinburgh, and entered the ministry of the Scotch Church. After preach- 
ing for some time at Glasgow, he went to London, and undertook a literary career, but 
died early, " a victim to sickness, disappointment, and misfortune." His principal 
works are: Velina, a Poetical Fragment; Vimanda, a Tragedy; The Independent, a 
Novel ; The Fair Apostate, a Tragedy ; Law and Loyalty, an Opera ; The Princess of 
Tarento, a Comedy, etc. 

William Julius Mickle, 1735-1788, acquired considerable dis- 
tinction as the translator of The Lusiad, by Camoens. 

Mickle was a native of Scotland. He was educated in Edinburgh, and resided for 
one year at Lisbon. He is the author of a number of poems, but is chiefly known as 
the translator of the celebrated epic which has been named. It is through the medium 
of this translation, almost exclusively, that the English public is acquainted with the 
Portuguese jjoet. The original is a work of high poetic power, and holds an acknowl- 
edged place in literatHre. The value of Mickle's translation, however, may be ques- 
tioned. For the translator, in accordance with the spirit of his age, deemed himself 
at liberty to deviate from the original wherever he thought that he could do so to ad- 
vantage. He himself says ingenuously : "It was not to gratify the dull few, whose 
greatest pleasure in reading a translation is to see what the author exactly says, — it 
was to give a poem that might live in the English language, which was the ambition 
of the translator." 

Mr. Mickle has long since departed, and his theory, we trust, with him. The " dull 
few," who now comprise the greatest critics that the world has ever seen, insist more 
than ever upon " seeing in a translation what the author exactly says," and can toler- 
ate no' tampering with the original. There is nothing against a poet's rewriting a 
theme borrowed from another language; but a translation, as a translation, cannot 
be anything more or less than ^.n exact reproduction of the original. Mickle, never- 
theless, is still entitled to our regard as being among the earliest promoters in England 
of modern cosmopolitan literature. 

John Scott, 1730-1783, was a member of the Society of Friends, who led a quiet life 
in the village of Amwell. He was a popular versifier, and he made also some essays 
in literary criticism, besides writing on social economics. His works are: Amwell, a 
Descriptive Poem, intended to immortalize his native village; Four Elegies, Descrip- 
tive and Moral, on the four seasons ; Critical Essays ; Observations on the Present 
State of the Parochial and Vagrant Poor; A Digest of the Highway and General 
Turnpike Laws, etc. 

IlENUT Brooke, 1706-1783, an Irish poet and novelist, was mentioned with commen- 
dation by Pope, Swift, Johnson, and others. Some of his writings were of a political 
and partisan character. Works: Universal Beauty, a Philosophical Poem; Transla- 
tion of the first three books of Tasso ; The Earl of Westmoreland, a Tragedy ; The 
Earl of Essex, a Tragedy ; Gustavus Tp,sa, a Play ; Redemption, a Poem ; Th^ Fopl of 



THE POETS. 315 

Quality, a novel ; Juliet Grenville, a noTel ; A New Collection of Fairy Tales; Famous 
Letters, on the plan of Swift's Drapier's Letters.— Charlotte Brooke, daughter of the 
novelist Henry Brooke, was the author of the following works : Reliques of Irish 
Poetry, translated into English vei-se; A Journey through England and Wales; Nat- 
ural History ; Emma, the Foundling of the Wood. 

Mrs. Frances Brooke, 1745-1789, the wife of an English clergyman, was the author 
of numerous works, prose and verse : Virginia, a Tragedy ; Siege of Siuope, a Tragedy : 
Rosina, a Play ; Marian, a Play ; The History of Lady Julia Mandeville, a novel ; The 
History of Clara Mandeville, a sequel to the preceding; The History of Emily Mon- 
tague ; Memoirs of the Marquis of St. Forlaix ; Elements of the History of England. 
Garrick refused to represent her tragedies, whereupon she endeavored to take revenge 
in a novel, The Excursion, which did not redound greatly to her credit. 

Robert Fergusson, 1750-1774, was a Scotch poet of considerable merit, but intem- 
perate habits, who by dissipation brought himself to poverty and finally to the insane 
asylum, and died at the early age of twenty-four. He was a native of Edinburgh, and 
was educated at St. Andrew's. His poems have been published in 2 vols. Burns was 
a great admirer of Fergusson's poetry, and erected a monument to his memory. 

Chatterton. 

Thomas Chatterton, 1752-1770, was a youthful poet, 
whose extraordinary talents and impostures are among the 
standing wonders of literary history. 

Early History. — Chatterton was born in Bristol, and was the son 
of a sexton. The family for some generations had been in charge of 
the Eadciifi' church, and it was in the muniment-room of this church 
that the young poet found the means for his impostures. In early 
childhood he was esteemed dull, and his first teacher, unable to make 
him learn the alphabet, sent him home to his mother. He had, how- 
ever, a morbid fancy for anything curious or antique. The illuminated 
capitals in some of the old manuscripts to which he had access ex- 
cited him ; and at the age of eight he learned to read, his mother 
teaching him out of an old black letter Testament. At the age of 
fourteen he was apprenticed to a scrivener, and not having much else 
to do, he eagerly devoured everything on the subject of heraldry and 
antiquities that came in his way. 

History of His Ztnpostures. — On the opening of the New Bridge, the Bristol 
papers contained A Description of the Fryer's First Passage over the Old Bridge, pur- 
porting to be taken from an ancient manuscript. The paper, which was a really 
curious affair, being traced to the boy Chatterton, he declared that it had been found 
by bis father, with many other old MSS., in an iron chest in the munimont-room of 
the church. Fr.tm this time, he continued to furnish to the public and to individuals 
specimens of these old MSS. "A citizen addicted to heraldry was presented with a 
pedigree which carried his name up to the Conquest; a religious gentleman was fii- 
vored with a fragment of a sermon ; and a Mr. Bergum received a poem, entitled The 



316 DE. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPOE A EIES . 

Romaunt of the Cnyglits, written by John de Bergham, an ancestor, four hundred and 
fifty years before ! " — Allibone. 

The poetical compositions which he furnished purported to be chiefly by W. Can- 
ynge, a Bristol merchant, and Thomas Rowley, a monk or secular priest, both of the 
fifteenth century. The peculiarities of the ancient manuscripts, the spelling, grammar, 
and modes of thought were so thoroughly imitated that the documents seemed cer- 
tainly genuine ; yet the poetry was of so superior a character to anything likely to 
be found in such circumstances, that the critics were sorely puzzled. A violent 
controversy arose on the question of the authenticity of these remarkable produc- 
tions. Why should a lad, who could produce from his own brain poetry of so high 
an order, tax his ingenuity to palm off the credit of it upon others? Nearly all the 
leading writers and critics of the day, Horace Walpole, Dr. Johnson, Gibbon, Bishop 
Percy, and a host of others, engaged in the discussion. Young Chatterton went to 
London, and readily made engagements with the booksellers, and was on the full tide 
of literary success, when suddenly he was found dead in his bed, from the effects of a 
dose of arsenic. There was a streak of insanity in the family, and the disease which, 
in the judgment of charity, led him to this sad end, was probably only another form 
of that which had prompted his strange impostures. He died at the age of seventeen 
years, nine months. It is worthy of remark that the poems which he ascribes to the 
old monk Rowley are greatly superior to those which he puts forth as his own. 

" Nothing can be more extraordinary than the delight which Chatterton appears to 
have felt in executing those numberless and multifarious impositions. His ruling 
passion was not the vanity of a poet who depends upon the opinion of other people's 
gratification, b^it the stoical pride of talent, which felt nourishment in the solitary 
contemplation of superiority over the dupes who fell into his toils." — Walter Scott. 

Works. — His principal poems are: The Tragedy of Ella; Ode to Ella; Execution 
of Sir Charles Bawdin ; Battle of Hastings; The Tournament ; A Description of Can- 
ynge's Feast, etc. 

IV. THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 

Bishop Warburton. 

William Warburton, 1698-1779, is one of the most con- 
spicuous figures of the times in which he lived, especially as 
a writer on polemic theology. His chief work. The Divine 
Legation of Moses, displayed prodigious learning and abili- 
ties. He is noted for his belligerent propensities, and for 
the great variety, as well as the extent, of his attainments. 

Early History. — Warburton never received a University education, 
but was trained for the bar and admitted to practice. His fondness for 
letters, however, led him to relinquish that profession for the church. 
After holding various preferments, he was, in somewhat tardy recogni- 
tion of his great merits and reputation, appointed by Pitt to the 
bishopric of Gloucester. 

Character. — Warburton belonged in a special sense to the church 
militant. His learning was the prodigious accumulation of incessant 



THEOLOGICAL WEITEES. 317 

reading, but his temper was of tlie acrid, controversial sort, and led 
him into several angry disputes. At one time he was among those 
who opposed Pope, but, on the appearance of the latter's Essay on 
Man, he entered the lists for the poet, and wrote a series of seven let- 
ters in vindication of the poem. This procured for him Pope's lasting 
friendship and good offices. 

Works. — Warburton published some early pieces of translation from the Latin, 
and an inquiry into the causes of miracles. These works he afterwards suppressed. 
His first great work was a treatise on The Alliance between Church and State, 
a masterly argument in favor of an established church. To this succeeded his 
Divine Legation of Moses, an argument against the deistical philosophy of the day. 
Into this work, and the Vindication which he wrote in reply to attacks upon it, War- 
burton poured all the treasures of his learning. It was i-egarded at the time as one 
of the very masterpieces of English theology. It must be said, however, that War- 
burton's positions have since been abandoned by clearer and better informed thinkers 
of the present day. The style is rough and often confused, but abounds in brilliant 
passages, and is a strong testimonial to the author's erudition. One of the most striking 
features of the work is Warburton's anticipation of modern discoveries in Egyptology. 
His next important work was a Discourse on the Emperor Julian's attempt at rebuild- 
ing the Temple at Jerusalem, soon followed by a treatise on The Principles of Natural 
and Revealed Religion, by a View of Bolingbroke's Philosophy, and by Remarks on 
Hume's Natural History of Religion. These works involved him in much controversy 
with the then deistical school, in which both sides lost their temper. 

Not satisfied with his true reputation as a theologian, Warburton ambitiously un- 
dertook the editing of Shakespeare's plays. This elicited from Douce the compliment 
that of all the Shakespeare commentators Warburton was surely the worst. 

According to Lord Jeffrey, Warburton was the last of the race of powerful English 
polemics, a giant in literature, but with many of the vices of the gigantic character. 

Thomas Edwards, 1699-1757, was a lawyer by profession, but never practised. He 
was a zealous student of Shakespeare, and being indignant at the arrogance displayed 
by Warburton in his edition of Shakespeare, wrote a satirical piece, purporting to be 
Canons of Criticism and a Glossary, being a Supplement to Mr. Warburton's Edition. 
The prelate was enraged, and made an angry reply, which led to a lively controversy. 
Edwards seems to have had the best of it ; but, after all, as Johnson well said, "A 
fly may sting and tease a horse, and yet the horse is the nobler animal." 

Bishop Lowth. 

Egbert Lowth, D. D., 1710-1787, Professor of Poetry at Oxford, was 
a man of eminent standing in the Church of England. 

Lowth held in succession several important bishoprics, and declined the Archbish- 
opric of Canterbury. His works are held in high estimation both for their tliooloi;ical 
and their literary value. His chief work was Praelcctions on Hebrew Poetry, written 
originally in Latin, and afterwards translated into English. Next to this in value 
was his New Translation of Isaiah with Preliminary Dissertations and Notes. Both 
these are standard works. He wrote also an English Grammar, which was the foun- 
dation of Murray's. 

William Lowth, D. D., 1661-1732. father of Bishop Lowth, was himself an eminent 
scholar and writer. Works : A Vindication of the Divine Authority and Inspiration 
27* 



318 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

of the Writings of the Old and New Testaments ; Directions for the Profitable Reading 
of the Scriptures ; Commentaries on Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor 
Prophets. 

Julius Bate, 1711-1771, was the author of a number of theological works. An Essay 
on the Third Chapter of Genesis, in answer to Warburton ; The Philosophical Principles 
of Moses, in answer to David Jennings ; An Inquiry into the Similitudes of the Lord 
God ; A Hebrew-English Dictionary without Points ; A New and Literal Translation 
of the Pentateuch and of the Historical Books to the end of Second Kings, with Notes. 
The two works last named were his principal literary performances. His Hebrew Dic- 
tionary is quoted with approbation by Parkhurst, but it failed to meet general accept- 
ance. His Translation was so extremely literal as to be at times absurd and unintel- 
ligible. "By giving the Hebrew idiom too literally, he has rendered his version 
neither Hebrew nor English." — Lowndes. He was an advocate of the Hutchinsonian 
school of philosophy and theology, and very intolerant of criticism or contradiction, 
and not a man of much power, though abundantly active in the use of such powers 
as he had. "This mild Hutchinsonian is vei-y angry with his humble servants, the 
Keviewers, whom he calls infidels and scorpions." — Allibone, " One Bate," " a zany." 
— Warburton. 

Dr. Dodd. 

William Dodd, D. D., 1729-1777, was noted equally for his shining 
abilities as a preacher and a writer, and for his ignominious end. 

Career, — Dr. Dodd was a clergyman of the Church of England. He was educated 
at Cambridge, and rose rapidly in church preferments. He was tutor to the young Earl 
of Chesterfield and one of the King's chaplains. Being fond of display, and living 
beyond his means, he ran in debt and resorted to fraud to extricate himself. lie wrote 
an anonymous letter to a lady of rank, offering her £3000 for her influence in obtain- 
ing for him an important rectory. The letter being traced to him caused him to be dis- 
missed from the King's list of chaplains. He forged the name of Lord Chesterfield to 
a bond for £4200, and, being convicted of the crime, he was executed for it at Tyburn. 

Works. — Dr. Dodd's publications are numerous and valuable: Discourses on the 
Miracles and Parables of Christ ; Sermons to Young Men ; The Visitor ; Comfort for the 
Afflicted; Thoughts in Prison; Reflections on Death; Commentary on the Old and 
New Testament; Beauties of Shakespeare ; Beauties of History, etc. 

James Hervey, 1713-1758, a divine of the English Church, edu- 
cated at Oxford, was a man of a very devotional spirit. 

Hervey's works have been published in 6 vols., 8vo. They consist of Theron and 
Aspasia, a series of Dialogues on important subjects ; Remarks on Bolingbroke's Let- 
ters on History; Sermons, Letters, etc.; and Meditations. Of the Dialogues, many 
editions were published. But the most popular by far was The Meditations. " Her- 
vey's Meditations, Pilgrim's Progress, The "Whole Duty of Man, and the Bible, are 
commonly seen together on a shelf in the cottages of England." The sentiments are 
devout, and there is a good deal of poetical imagery, but the style is inflated and 
pompous. " I advise students of oratory to imitate Mr. Hervey's piety rather than 
his style." — Blair. 

William Law, 1687-1761, a graduate and Fellow of Cambridge, 
gave up his Fellowship in 1761 and became a Non-conformist. 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 319 

Law's works have been printed in 9 vols., 8vo. Most of them are controversial and 
are of no special interest except as a part of the history of the times. Others, as 
The Serious Call to a Holy Life, and The Treatise on Christian Perfection, are still 
among our most popular works on practical religion. 

"When at Oxford, I took up Law's Serious Call to a Holy Life, expecting to find it 
a dull hook (as such hooks generally are), and perhaps laugh at it. But I found Law 
quite an overmatch for me; and this was the first occasion of my thinking in earnest 
of religion after I became capable of rational inquiry." — Johnson. "He [Johnson] 
much commended Law's Serious Call, which he said was the finest piece of hortatory- 
theology in any language." — BoswelVs Life of Johnson. 

"Mr. Law's masterpiece — The Serious Call — Is still read as a popular and powerful 
book of devotion. His precepts are rigid, but they are founded on the gospel ; his 
satire is sharp, but it is drawn from the knowledge of human life; and many of his 
portraits are not unworthy of the pen of La Bruyere. If he finds a spark of piety in 
the reader's mind, he will soon kindle it into a flame; and a philosopher must allow 
that he exposes with equal severity and truth the strange contradiction between the 
faith and practice of the Christian world."— Gibbon. 

Edmund Law, D. D., 1703-1787, was a metaphysician and a man 
of great learning. 

His principal works are : A Translation into English of Archbishop King's Essay on 
the Origin of Evil ; An Inquiry into the Ideas of Space, Time, etc.; Considerations on 
the Theory of Religion; An Edition of the Works of Locke, with a Life and Preface. 
Law's woi-ks, without having much originality, were yet the occasion of much discus- 
sion and earnest controversy, and are often referred to in the history of those times. 

Thomas Newton, D. D., 1704-1782, a graduate of Cambridge, and 
a Bishop of the English Church, is well known to theological litera- 
ture by his large work on The Prophecies. 

This was for a long time considered a standard work on this subject, but has of late 
lost much of its authority as a true interpretation of the prophetical writings. New- 
toQ published also numerous Sermons, and Dissertations on vai-ious parts of Scripture. 

Ebenezer Erskine, 1680-1754, was a Scotch Presbyterian divine, educated at the Uni- 
versity of Edinburgh. In consequence of his views respecting church patronage, he 
and sundry others separated themselves from the Church of Scotland, and formed the 
body known as The Seceders. His Sermons have been printed in 3 vols., Svo, and are 
held in high estimation. 

Ralph Erskine, 1685-1752, brother of Ebenezer, likewise joined the Seceders. He 
was a preacher of popular abilities, and was much honored for his Christian zeal and 
devotion. His works, mainly Sermons, have been published in 10 vols., Svo. One 
volume of his works is made up of Poems. The poems are divided into Gospel Son- 
nets ; Old Testament Songs ; New Testament Songs. 

.ToHN Erskine, D.D., 1721-1803, an eminent divine of the Church of Scotland, 
was educated at the University of Edinburgh, and was a colleague of Dr. Robertson in 
the Old Gray-Friars' Church. " His sermons may be ranked among t1ie best specimens 
of pulpit composition. They are distinguished by purity and energy of style, pre- 



320 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

cision of thought, and originality of sentiment." — Darling. They have been published 
in 2 vols., 8vo. 

Robert Robinson, 1735-1790, received no more education than that of the grammar- 
school, and was for a number of years a hair-dresser's apprentice. When only nineteen 
years old, Robinson became a Methodist preacher. In 1759 he received the charge of a 
Baptist congregation in Cambridge. He was regarded as one of the most eloquent 
preachers of his day, even surpassing Robert Hall. Besides his pulpit labors, Robin- 
son published a number of theological works, among which are A Plea for the Divin- 
ity of Jesus Christ; Lectures on the Principles of Non-conformity; a translation of 
Saurin's Sermons, i'rom the French, etc. His sermons and original discourses ap- 
peared posthumously, in 1796. 

Alexander Cruden, 1701-1770, is known to literature by his one 
work, The Concordance to the Holy Scriptures. 

Cruden was a native of Aberdeen, and was educated at Marischal College, with the 
intention of entering the ministry, from which however he was prevented by discov- 
ering symptoms of insanity. He went to London, opened a bookstore, and employed 
himself mainlj^ as a corrector of the press. His Concordance was first issued in 1737. 
It will probably stand while the world stands, — or at least while the English is a 
known tongue, or the English Bible a book to be read and studied. 

Cruden wrote some other books and short pieces, under the name of Alexander the 
Corrector, but they are of little account. 

Hugh Fa^rmer, 1714-1787, was a Dissenting minister, a pupil of Doddridge, and a 
man of great learning. His works are : Christ's Temptation in the Wilderness ; A 
Dissertation on Miracles; Essay on the Demoniacs of the New Testament; Worship of 
Human Spirits in the Ancient Heathen Nations, etc. 

" The works of Farmer are among the most ingenious and learned theological pro- 
ductions of the last century. At the same time they require to be read with caution. 
Our Lord's temptation, according to Farmer, was a divine vision ; the demoniacs, 
merely persons strongly affected by certain diseases." — Orme. 

Gill the Commentator. 

John Gill, D. D., 1697-1771, was a Baptist divine of great learn- 
ing, though mainly self-taught, 

- While a mere boy. Gill was fond of frequenting the bookstores, so that it became a 
sort of proverb : " Such a thing is as sure as that John Gill is in the bookseller's shop." 
His chief publications are the following : Expositions of the Old and New Testaments, 
9 vols.. 4to ; Exposition of Solomon's Song, which is different from the preceding, 
comprising tlie substance of 122 sermons on the subject, fol. ; A Body of Doctrinal and 
Practical Divinity, 3 vols., 4to ; Prophecies respecting the Messiah ; The Cause of God 
and Truth, in reply to the Arminians ; Dissertation on the Antiquity of the Hebrew 
Language ; Sermons, Tracts, etc. 

" He moves through his Exposition like a man in lead, and overwhelms the inspired 
writer with dull lucubrations and rabbinical lumber. ... If the reader'be inclined 
for a trial of his thoughts and patience, he may procure the burden of Dr. Gill. He 
was, after all, a man of undoubted learning, and of prodigious labor." — Orme. 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 321 

John Brown of Haddington, 1722-1787, was a man distinguished for his knowledge 
of languages, and was the author of several popular religious works : A Dictionary of 
the Bible, 2 vols., 8vo ; A General History of the Christian Church, 2 vols., 12mo; Self- 
Interpreting Bible, that is, a Bible with marginal references and short notes. 

Job Orton, 1717-1783, was an eminent Dissenting divine,' associated 
in many ways with Dr. Doddridge. 

Orton's chief work was An Exposition of the Old Testament for the Use of Families, 
6 vols., Svo, intended to be a companion to Doddridge's Family Expositor of the New 
Testament. Besides this, Orton wrote Memoirs of Doddridge ; Discourses to the Aged; 
Sacramental Meditations ; Letters to a Young Clergyman, etc. 

Lardner. 

Nathaniel Lardner, D. D,, 1684-1768, wrote a work of immense 
learning on The Credibility of the Gospel History. 

Lardner was a native of Kent. He studied at London, Utrecht, and Leyden, and 
became a Dissenting minister. The principal Avorks of Dr. Larduer are : The Credibility 
of the Gospel History, published originally in 17 vols.; The History of the Apostles 
and Evangelists ; and The History of the Heretics of the First Two Centuries. His 
works give evidence of immense reading and industry, as well as sound judgment, and 
are regarded as exhaustive of the biblical learning of the times. 

Samuel Pike, 1717-1777, a Dissenter, is known chiefly by his Cases of Conscience. 
He wrote also Philosophia Sacra, or The Principles of Natural Philosophy extracted 
from Divine Revelation, a Hutchinsouian work; Nature and Evidences of Saving 
Faith ; Compendious Hebrew Lexicon^ etc. 

John Mason, 1705-1763, a Dissenting divine, published a large number of works, 
of which, however, only one is now much known, and that is a treatise on Self-Knowl- 
edge. It has passed through numerous editions, and is still in active demand. 

Rev. Thomas Harmer, 1715-1788, a Dissenting minister, celebrated for his learning, 
was a native of Norwich. Among his works maybe named the following: Observa- 
tions on Various Passages and Scriptures, with illustrations from travels and voyages, 
4 vols., Svo ; Outlines of a New Commentary on Solomon's Song, etc. 

Francis Blackburne, 1705-1787, a minister of the English Church, wrote numerous 
works, the chief of which was The Confessional, intended to oppose subscription to 
articles. It produced a war of pamphlets, no less than seventy having been written 
for and against his book. " His style is strong and animated, and his controversial 
writings are more entertaining than such compositions usually are." — Darling. His 
works are published in 7 vols., Svo. 

John Chapman, 1704-1784, was the author of many theological and other works : 
Eusebius, or The True Christian's Defence against a late Book entitled The Moral 
Philosopher; Miscellaneous Tracts relating to Antiquity; The Expediency and Credi- 
bility of Miraculous Powers among the Primitive Christians, after the Decease of the 
Apostles, etc. 



322 DR. JOHNSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Edwakd Bentham, D. D., 1707-1776, a learned divine of the English Church, Regius 
Professor of Divinity at Oxford, and the author of several works. An Introduction to 
Moral Philosophy ; Reflections upon the Study of Divinity ; Advice to a Young Man 
of Rank on Coming to the University, et2. — Rev. James Bentham, 1709-1794, a brother 
of Dr. Edward Bentham, and the author of History and Antiquities of the Conventual 
and Cathedi'al Church of Ely, which is highly extolled for its accurate knowledge of 
architecture in general and of the antiquities of this edifice in particular. He wrote 
also, in connection with Warton, Grosse, and Milner, Essays on Gothic Architecture. 

John Jortin, D. D., 1698-1770, an eminent scholar and divine of the English Church, 
wrote several works of value- The following are the chief: Remarks on Authors, 
Ancient and Modern; Discourse on the Truth of the Christian Religion; Remarks on 
Ecclesiastical History, 5 vols.; Dissertations on Different Subjects; Life of Erasmus, 2 
vols., 4to ; Sermons, Tracts, etc., etc. 

William Adams, D.D., 1707-1789, Master of Pembroke College, Oxford, was a par- 
ticular friend of Dr. Johnson's, and the author of an able Reply to Hume's Essay on 
Miracles, and of several published sermons. 

Robert Sandeman, 1718-1771, was the founder of the sect of the Sandemanians. He 
was born at Perth, Scotland. He formed a church or congregation in London, in 1762 ; 
emigrated to America in 1764, and gathered a congregation in Danbury, Connecticut. 
The Sandemanians have not multiplied to any considerable extent, and are now chiefly 
noticeable from the fact that the late eminent chemist, Faraday, was of their number. 
Sandeman wrote Thoughts on Chiistianity; The Sign of the Prophet Jonah; The 
Honor of Marriage opposed to all Impurities; Letters on Theron and Aspasia; Corre- 
spondence with Mr. Samuel Pike. 



Bishop Challoner. 

Richard Challoner, D.D., 1691-1781, a learned Bishop 
of the Catholic Church in England, wrote many works, 
partly controversial, and partly dogmatic and devotional, 
and is highly esteemed as a writer. 

Challoner published an English Bible, being in some sense a new 
version, and differing considerably in its diction from that of the 
Eheims-Douay. Dr. Challoner' s version has been followed more than 
any other by English-speaking Catholics since his day, and his influ- 
ence upon the language of religion and devotion among Catholics has 
been accordingly very great. His influence in this respect has been 
still further increased by the great and continued popularity of his 
books on practical religion, such as ''The Catholic Christian In- 
structed," " Meditations," and other devotional works, some of which 
have been circulated by millions. So familiar, indeed, is the language 
of Challoner to Catholic Christians generally, that whenever, in any 
diocese, the question arises as to which English version of the Vulgate 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 323 

sliall be authorized for use in that diocese, the preference is given to 
Challoner's, rather than to the Hheims-Doiiay, notwithstanding the tra- 
ditional veneration in which the latter is held. This was the decision 
of the late Cardinal Wiseman, and has been that of most English- 
speaking Bishops of the Catholic Church for the last hundred years. 

WorJes. — The following are Bishop Challoner's principal publications: Church 
History, 3 vols.; Grounds of Catholic Doctrine; Grounds of the Old Religion; Uner- 
ring Authority of the Catholic Church; Memoirs of Missionary Priests; Spirit of Dis- 
senting Teachers ; Caveat against Methodism ; Meditations for Every Day in the Year ; 
A Manual of Prayer and Other Christian Devotions : The Catholic Christian Instructed ; 
Think "Well On 't, etc. Dr. Challoner -writes with great vigor and freshness of 
thought, and in a style remarkable for its sparkling clearness and the purity of his 
English, 

Alban Butler, 1700-1773, an English Catholic, edu- 
cated at Douay, and for a long time President at St. Omer's, 
spent a large part of thirty years in his compilation of The 
Lives of the Saints. 

Butler wrote several works on practical religion, but the large work 
just named, in 12 vols., 8vo, is the only one by which he is well known. 
" It is a work of merit : — the sense and learning belong to the author ; 
the prejudices are those of his profession." — Gibbon, "As it is known 
what 'prejudices' means in ISIr. Gibbon's vocabulary, our author's rela- 
tives accept the character." — Charles Butler. 

The " Lives of the Saints " was translated into French, Spanish, and Italian, and it 
has passed through several editions. It is a storehouse of curious learning, both eccle- 
siastical and secular, and it is written in a style of great purity and beauty. The 
author appears to have been a man of refinement and culture, singularly inoifensive 
in manners and spii-it, carrying out in his life that amenity of temper everj-where 
observable in his writings. " He was zealous in the cause of religion, but his zeal was 
without bitterness or animosity: polemic acrimony was unknown to Mm. He never 
forgot that in every heretic he saw a brother Christian ; in every infidel he saw a 
brother man." — Charles Butler. 

James Archer, a Catholic clerscyman, pi.iblished, in 17S9, Sermons for All the 
Sundays in the Year, in 4 vols.; and, in 1794, Sermons for the Principal Festivals in 
the Year, in 5 vols. These sermons are highly commended for their popular character, 
and, not being of a controversial nature, have been much used by Protestants as well 
as Catholics. 

Thomas Philltps, 170S-1774. was a zealous Cntholic, educated at St. Omer's, and resi- 
dent for many years in the family of the Earl of Siirewsbury. He retired in the de- 
cline of life to the English College at Liege, and remained there until his death. He 
Avrote The Study of Sacred Literature fully Stated and Considered; Tlie History of 
the Life of Reginald Pole; Reasons for the Repeal of the Law against the Papists, etc 



324 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 

EXTRACTS. 

LIGHT THE SHADOW OF GOD. 

Light that makes things seen makes some things invisible. Were 
it not for darkness and the shadow of the earth, the noblest part of 
creation had remained miseen, and the stars in heaven [had been] as 
invisible as on the fourth day, when they were created above the 
horizon with the sun, and there was not an eye to behold them. The 
greatest mystery of religion is expressed by adumbration, and in the 
noblest part of Jewish types we find the cherubim shadowing the 
mercy-seat. Life itself is but the shadow of death, and souls departed 
are but the shadows of the living. All things fall under this name. 
The sun itself is but the dark Simulacrum, and light but the shadow 
of God. — Sir Thomas Browne. 



THE MOEAL SUBLIME. 
Look, then, abroad through nature, to the range 
Of planets, suns, and adamantine spheres. 
Wheeling unshaken through the void immense ; 
And speak, oh man ! does this capacious scene 
With half that kindling majesty dilate 
Thy strong conception, as when Brutus rose 
Kefulgent from the stroke of Caesar's fate. 
Amid the crowd of patriots ; and, his arm 
Aloft extending, like eternal Jove 
When guilt brings down the thunder, called aloud 
On Tully's name, and shook his crimson steel, 
And bade the father of his country, hail ! 
For lo ! the tyrant prostrate on the dust, 
And Eome again is free ! — Akenside. 





CHAPTER XIII. 

CowpER AND His Contemporaries. 

During the last fifteen years of the eighteenth century, 
there was no English writer equal in originality and power 
to the poet Cowper. He is taken, therefore, as the repre- 
sentative man of the period. The great political event of 
the time was the outbreak of the French Revolution. 

The writers of this period are divided into four sections : 
1. The Poets, beginning with Cowper ; 2. The Dramatists, 
beginning with Sheridan; 3. Miscellaneous Prose Writers, 
beginning with Hannah More; 4. Theological Writers, be- 
ginning with the Wesleys. 

Note. — At no point in the history of English literature is it so dif- 
ficult to mark a well-defined period as here. Many writers, whom it 
is necessary to include in the present chapter, had intimate relations 
with the writers and the events of the previous period. Many of 
the writers, on the other hand, survived far into the present century, 
and had relations with Scott, Byron, Coleridge, and their associates. 
Yet a careful consideration of their several cases will, it is believed, 
show that the main connection of these writers, after all, was with 
the writers and events of the last fifteen years of the eighteenth cen- 
tury. It is still more evident that the popular literature of the period, 
particularly in its poetical and theological aspects, assumed new and 
marked features, after Cowper and the AVesleys and the religious 
movement which they represented had received full and distinct re- 
cognition. 

28 325 



326 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 



I. THE POETS. 

Cowper. 

William Cowper, 1731-1800, created anew era in English 
poetry — springing at a bound into a place in the popular 
heart far more firmly established, far more deeply set, than 
Pope had ever attained. Pope had been the poet of the 
wits ; Cowper became the poet of the race. The poems of 
his which first touched the popular heart were The Task, 
and the ballad of John Gilpin. The impression thus pro- 
duced was deepened by his Hymns, contributed to the Olney 
collection, and by his extended work, the Translation of 
Homer. 

. Early Life. — Cowper, though in moderate circumstances at the time 
of his birth, was connected, both on his father's and his mother's side, 
with some of the noblest families in England, He was of a gentle, 
sensitive nature, and through life he instinctively shrank from what- 
ever required any sort of rude encounter with his fellows. At the 
age of six, his mother being dead, he was sent for two years to a board- 
ing-school, where he suffered intolerable hardships from the tyranny 
of one of the older boyvS. He then went to Westminster School, where 
he served an apprenticeship of seven years to the classics. 

A Law Student. — At the age of eighteen, he was articled as a clerk 
in a law office, his fellow-student being Thurlow, who afterwards be- 
came Lord Chancellor. It is easy to imagine what sort of a figure 
such a character as Cowper would make in a law office. " There was 
I and the future Lord Chancellor constantly employed from morning 
till night in giggling and making giggle." In due time, however, he 
was called to the bar, and he took chambers, but he gained no clients. 

Failure of his Plans. — His father was now dead, he was in his 
thirty-second year, and his patrimony was nearly gone. At this crisis, 
one of his powerful kinsmen procured for him the lucrative appoint- 
ment of Clerk of the Journals to the House of Lords. The dread of 
qualiiying himself by going through the necessary formalities in pres- 
ence of the Lords, plunged him into the deepest distress. The seeds 
of insanity were already in his frame, and after brooding a while over 
his condition, he became entirely insane, and attempted suicide. In 
the course of two years, under treatment at a private asylum, the 



THE POETS. 327 

cloud passed away, and he retired to a small country town where his 
brotlier resided. 

Newton and the JJntvins. — While living with his brother he formed an inti- 
macy with the clergyman of thephice, Rev. Mr. Unwin, and finally became an inmate 
of the family. After the death of Mr. Unwin, his widow, Mary Unwin, continued to 
watch over Cowper with a friendship that never faltered. The family removed, how- 
ever, to Olney, the residence of the Rev. Mr. Newton ; and from that time John New- 
ton and Mary Unwin are the main figures in the canvas which contains the pictures 
of Cowper's life. Here he contributed some Hymns to the volume which Mr. Newton 
was preparing. His morbid melauchoiy again returned, and he became once more 
entirely insane. 

On recovering from this second attack, Cowper amused himself with gardening, 
drawing, rearing hares, and writing poetry. A volume of his poems was published in 
1782, but it attracted little attention and had small sales. It brought him pleasant 
words, however, from his friends aud'competent critics, and he began to resume his 
wonted cheerfulness. 

TjCidy Attsten — At this time, Lady Austen, a widow, became one of the frequent 
guests of the household, and it was at her suggestion that Cowper wrote the inimi- 
table poem of John Gilpin, she having given him the outline of the story. The 
effect of this poem was electrical, not only upon the public, but upon the author. 
At Lady Austen's suggestion Cowper next tried his hand at blank verse, the result 
being The Task, the subject as before being assigned by this most wise and judicious 
adviser. The Task was immediately and universally popular. It opened an altogether 
new field in English letters. In another poem, Tirocinium, he gave utterance to 
his opinion of the scandalous practices in the public schools of England. This was 
followed by no less an undertaking than a new Translation of Homer, which he com- 
pleted in 1791, after seven years of continued labor. 

The Closing Scene, — After this a deepening gloom began to settle on his mind, 
with occasional bright intervals. His life-long friend, Mary Unwin, died in 1796. 
" The unhappy poet would not believe that she was actually dead ; he went to see the 
body, and on witnessing the unaltered placidity of death, flung himself to the other 
side of the room with a passionate expression of feeling, and from that time he never 
mentioned her name, or spoke of her again." Cowper lingered on for three years or 
more, when death came at last to his release. 

"So sad and strange a destiny has never before or since been that of a man of 
genius. With wit and humor at will, he was nearly all his life plunged in the darkest 
melancholy. Innocent, pious, and confiding, he lived in perpetual dread of everlast- 
ing punishment: he could only see between him and heaven a high wall, which he 
despaired of ever being able to scale ; yet his intellectual vigor was not subdued by 
affliction. What he wrote for anmsement or relief, in the midst of 'supreme distress,' 
surpasses the elaborate efforts of others made under the most favorable circum- 
stances ; and in the very winter of his days, his fancy was as fresh and blooming as 
in the spring and morning of existence. That he was constitutionally prone to mel- 
ancholy and insanity, seems undoubted ; but as surely the predisposing causes were 
aggravated by his strict and secluded mode of life." — Chambers. 

Bey. John Newton, 1725-1807, is indissolublj associated with the 
liistory and the writings of Cowper. 



328 COWPER AXD HIS C OXT E MPO R ARIES . 

Newton was a native of London. He went to sea at the age of eleven ; was engaged 
for some years in the slave-trade, experienced a religious conversion of an extraordi- 
nary character, and became afterwards a very zealous preacher. He was for seventeen 
years curate of the church at Olney, and he is chiefly known by his connection with 
that church. The Olney Hymns, selected and partly composed hx Newton, Cowper, 
and James Montgomery, are well known, and form a marked feature in the history of 
English hymnody. Newton's writings are of the extreme evangelical type, and are 
noted for the rich vein of experimental religion that runs through them. They have 
been printed in 6 vols., 8vo. The following are some of them : Cardiphonia ; Letters 
to a Wife ; Omicron Letters ; Sermons, etc. Newton exercised a powerful influence 
on the mind of Cowper, who was for many years one of his parishioners. 

Erasmts Daet\t:n, 1731-1802, attracted considerable attention both 
as a poet and a naturalist. 

Darwin was a physician by profession, and was educated at Cambridge. He wrote 
in a pleasing style, and the novelty and daring of some of his speculations caused his 
works to be a good deal read. The errors in his theories, however, were exposed by 
Dugald Stewart, Thomas Brown, and other metaphysicians, and bis writings gradually 
subsided into comparative oblivion. Works : The Botanic Garden, a Poem, in two 
parts. Economy of Vegetation, and the Loves of Plants ; The Temple of Nature, a Poem, 
with Philosophical Notes; Zoonomia, or The Laws of Organic Life; Phytologia, or 
The Philosophy of Agriculture and Gardening, etc. 

Beattie. 

James Beattie, D. C. L., 1735-1803, Professor of Moral Philosophy 
and Logic in Marischal College, Aberdeen, was a friend and contempo- 
rary of Johnson, Goldsmith, Reynolds, Garrick, ?ind others of that class. 
He is well known as a jDoet and as a writer on moral and metaphysical 
subjects. 

Beattie's most popular work is The Minstrel, a poem in the Spenserian stanza. Of 
his prose works, the chief are: Essay on Truth, intended as a reply to Hume; Evi- 
dences of the Christian Religion; Elements of Moral Science. The Essay on Truth 
met with great and immediate favor. It brought him the offer of the chair of Moral 
Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh, which, however, he declined. It gained 
him also the acquaintance and intimacy of the most distinguished writers of the day, 
and a substantial token of royal favor in the shape of a pension of £200 per annum. 

Dr. Beattie gives the following account of his interview with King George III. and 
the Queen : " They both complimented me in the highest terms on my Essay, which 
they said was a book they always kept by them ; and the King said he had one copy 
of it at Kew, and another in town, and he immediately went and took it down from 
the shelf. ' I never stole a book but once,' said his Majesty, ' and that was yours. I 
stole it from the Queen, to give it to Lord Hertford to read.' He had heard that the 
sale of Hume's Essays had failed since my book was published ; and I told him what 
Sir. Strahan had told me in regard to that matter." ' 

Johnson was a great admirer of Beattie. Bishop Warburton pronottnced him "su- 
perior to the whole crew of Scotch metaphysicians." Cowper praises him in unmeas- 
ured terms. The present current of opinion in regard to his merits is at a much lower 



THE POETS. 329 

level. The Edinburgh Re^•ie'w speaks of him almost with contempt. " Every one has 
not the capacity of writing philosophically ; but every one may be at least temperate 
and candid ; and Dr. Beattie's work is still more remarkable for being abusive and 
acrimonious, than for its defects in argument and originality." — Edinhurgh Eevieiv. 

"Beattie, the most agreeable and amial'le writer I ever met with, the only author 
I have seen whose critical and philosophical researches are diversified and embel- 
lished by a poetical imagination, that makes even the driest subject and the leanest a 
feast for an epicure in books. He is so much at his ease, too, that his own character 
appears in every page, and which is very rare, we see not only the \\Titer, but the man ; 
and the man so gentle, so well-tempered, so happy in his religion, and so humane in 
his philosophy, that it is necessary to love him if one has any sense of what is lovely." 
— Cowper. 

The truth lies probably between these two extreme verdicts. A present estimate 
of Beattie's poetical merits is thus expressed : " The Minstrel is an harmonious and 
eloquent composition, glowing with poetical sentiment ; but its inferiority in the 
highest poetical qualities may be felt by comparing it with Thomson's Castle of Indo- 
lence, which is perhaps the other work in the language which it most nearly resembles, 
but which yet it resembles much in the same way as gilding does solid gold, or as col- 
ored water might be made to resemble wine." — Craik. 

Thomas Blacklocs, D. D., 1721-1791, was a poet and divine whose history borders 
upon the romantic. He was of poor parents, and he lost his sight by small-pox when 
only six months old ; yet by indomitable energy and perseverance he made out to 
acquire a classical education, became a Doctor of Divinity, and an author of no mean 
celebrity. His poems were published with a preface by Spence, the Professor of 
Poetrj' at Oxford. He published also Paraclesis, or Consolations deduced from Natu- 
ral and Revealed. Religion, and several other works ; and he wrote an article, published 
in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, On the Education of the Blind. 

Burns. 

Robert Burns, 1759-1796, was "by far the greatest poet 
that ever sprung from the bosom of the people and lived and 
died in an humble condition." — Wilson. 

Career. — Burns was a poor ]oloughboy, with no advantages of edu- 
cation except those afforded by the common country school. His early 
effusions were circulated at first in manuscript. Finding that they 
were in demand among his neighbors, he printed a volume of them at 
an obscure coimtry town, in 1786. His special object in the publica- 
tion was to get money to enable him to emigrate to Jamaica. The 
publication yielded him a profit of £20, which seemed a fortune to the 
young author. He engaged his passage accordingly, sent his chest 
aboard the vessel, and was just about to set sail, when he received from 
Dr. Blacklock a letter inviting him to visit Edinburgh. The Doctor 
had fallen in with a copy of the poems, and encouraged Burns to be- 
lieve that an edition might be published in the capital. 
23- 



330 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

The poet changed at once his plans, and went to Edlnhurgh. There 
his wonderful abilities, in connection with the humbleness of his posi- 
tion, created a great sensation. Dugald Stewart, Robertson the his- 
torian, Dr. Hugh Blair, and all that was most aristocratic in either the 
intellectual or the social circles of that reserved and haughty metrop- 
olis, gathered in admiring wonder around this inspired peasant. A 
new edition of his poems was printed, which brought him at once the 
handsome sum of £700. He was caressed and feted on all sides, and 
being of an ardent temperament, he yielded to the temptation which 
these social festivities presented. He fell into the habit of drinking to 
intoxication, from which he never totally recovered, though he made 
sundry attempts at reform. He died at the early age of thirty-seven, 

Iteception at EdinhurgU. — "It needs no effort of imagination to conceive 
what the sensations of an isolated set of scholars (almost all either clergymen or pro- 
fessors) must have been in the presence of this big, broad, black-browed, brawny 
stranger, with his great flashing eyes, who having forced his way among them from 
the plough-tail, at a single stride, manifested, in the whole strain of his bearing and 
conversation, a most thorough conviction that in the society of the most eminent men 
of his nation he was exactly where he was entitled to be : hardly deigned to flatter 
them by exhibiting even an occasional symptom of being flattered by their notice ; by 
turns calmly measured himself against the most cultivated understandings of his time, 
in discussion ; overpowered the hon-mots of the most brilliant convivialists by broad 
floods of merriment, impregnated with all the burning life of genius; astounded 
bosoms habitually enveloped in the thrice-piled folds of social reserve, by compelling 
them to tremble, — nay, to tremble visibly, — beneath the fearless tones of natural 
pathos." — Lochhart. 

JEstintate of his Works. — " All that remains of Bums, the writings he has left, 
seem to us no more than a poor, mutilated fraction of what was in him ; brief broken 
glimpses of a genius that could never show itself complete ; that wanted all things 
for comjjleteness : — culture, leisure, true effect, nay, even length of life. His poems 
are, with scarcely an exception, mere occasional effusions, poured forth with little 
premeditation, expressing, by such means as offered, the passion, opinion, or humor 
of the hour. Never in one instance was it permitted to grapple with any subject with 
the full collection of his strength, to fuse and mould it in the concentrated fire of his 
genius." — Thomas Carlyle. 

Rev. James Grahame, 1765-1811, is favorably known bj 
his poem, The Sabbath. 

Grahame was born in Glasgow, and educated at its University. He 
followed the law for a time, but afterwards entered the ministry of the 
English Church. He was very acceptable as a preacher, but was 
obliged to give up his curacy on account of ill health. His poetry is 
of a very serious cast, and not at all to the taste of such men as Byron, 
who calls him " sepulchral Grahame." For all that, he has substan- 



THE POETS. 331 

tial merits and not a few admirers. His best and best known poem is 
called The Sabbath. 

An anecdote is told connected witli the publication of his poem which affords an in- 
teresting illustration of his character. " He had not prefixed his name to the work, 
nor acquainted his family with the secret of its composition, and taking a copj^ of the 
volume home with him one day, he left it on the table. His wife began reading it, 
while the sensitive author walked up and down the room; and at length she broke 
out into praise of the poem, adding, ' Ah, James, if you could but produce a poem 
like this ! ' The joyful acknowledgment of his being the author was then made."— 
Chamhp.rs. 

Grahame's other poems are: Biblical Pictures; Bride of Scotland; British Georgics; 
Poems on the Abolition of the Slave Trade, etc. 

" Grahame in some respects resembles Cowper. He has no humor or satire, it is true, 
but the same powers of close and happy observation, which the poet of Olney applied 
to English scenery, were directed by Grahame to that of Scotland, and both were 
strictly devout and national poets. There is no author, excepting Burns, whom an 
intelligent Scotsman, resident abroad, would read with more delight tlian Grahame. 
The ordinary features of the Scottish landscape he portrays truly and distinctly, with- 
out exaggeiation, and often imparting to his description a feeling of tenderness and 
solemnity. He has, however, many poor prosaic lines, and his versification generally 
wants ease and variety, lie was content with humble things ; but he paints the 
charms of a retired cottage life, the sacred calm of a Sabbath morning, a walk in the 
fields, or even a bird's nest, with such unfeigned delight and accurate observation, 
that the reader is constrained to see and feel with his author, to rejoice in the ele- 
ments of poetrj' and meditation that ai'e scattered around him, existing in the hum- 
blest objects, and in those humane and pious sentiments which impart to external na- 
ture a moral interest and beauty " — Chambers. 

Richard Cumberland, 1732-1811, was a grandson of T)r. Bentley, and otherwise hon- 
orably connected. He was employed by the Government in 1780 on a secret mission to 
Spain and Portugal, but tlie mission was unsuccessful and disasti-ous. He devoted 
himself afterwards to literary pursuits. His works are numerous, and are of some 
value, though none of them belonging to the first class. The following are the chief: 
The Wheel of Fortune, The "West Indian, The Jew, and The Fashionable Lover, Com- 
edies; John de Lancaster, Arundel, and Henry, novels; A Yersion of Fifty Psalms of 
David; The Exodiad; Calvary, or the Death of Christ; Anecdotes of Spanish Painters 
in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries ; The Observer, a series of Essays like The 
Spectator, in 5 vols.; lastly, Memoirs, interspersed with anecdotes of the distinguished 
men of his time. "It is indeed one of the author's most pleasing works, and conveys 
a very accurate idea of his talents, feelings, and character, with many powerful 
sketches of the age which has passed away." — Sir Walter Scott. 

Peter Pindar. 

Jotin Wolcot, 1738-1819, an erratic genius, better known 
by his pseudonym of Peter Pindar, was a satirical writer of 
some note. 

Wolcot was educated as a physician, and went to Jamaica to estab- 
lish himself there. Failing in this profession, he obtained a curacy. 



n ), 



COWPER AXD HIS C X T E 3IP O H A E IE; 



As the charge was merely a noaiinal one, lie amused liimself occasion- 
ally on Sunday by pigeon-shooting. In 176S he returned to England, 
and endeavored once more to estahKsh himseK as a physician. Fail- 
ing again, he betook himself to writing, and for twenty or thirry years 
electrified the good, easy public by his satires and squibs. 

Peter Pindar is beyond donbt a shrewd, clerer writer, and had tlie themes of his 
pieces been proportionate to their execution, he would take a high rank among Eng- 
lish satirists. As it is, he has fallen into neglect. His productions are rery numer- 
ous, and upon all coneeirable snbjects of second or third rate order. The l>e>t kn.<\ra 
are the Apple-Dumplings and a King, Whitbread's Brewery visited by their 3Iajesties 
(both directed against George III., then already half-witted), Lyric Odes on the Royal 
Academy Exliibition, Epistles to a Fallen Minister, Odes to Mr. Paine, The Louisiad, 
a Heroi-Comic Poem, and Bozzy and Piozzy, a satire upon the quarrel between Boswell 
and Mrs.Piozzi, who had published her Kecollections of Samuel Johnson. 

Peter Pindar spared no one, high or low. It was even reported that the lyiinistry 
bribed or attempted to bribe him into silence by a pension of £200. He became in- 
volved in a literary feud with Gifford, which led to a personal encounter in the street, 
and Peter was left in the gutter, or, as one critic has expressed it — "he returned to 
what was often the Castalia of Ms inspiration." 



Mrs. Inchbald. 

IMLrs. Elizabeth Iis^chbaxd, 1756-1S21, was a writer of consider- 
able celebrity at the close of the last century. 

Mrs. Inchbald was a native of Suffolk, the daughter of Mr. Simpson, a farmer. At 
the age of sixteen, she came to London and made her debut upon the stage. Soon 
aftemards she married Mr. Inchbald, a leading actor. Mrs. Inchbald was extremely 
successful as an actress until her retirement iu 37S9. From that time she devoted 
herself exclusively to dramatic literature, publishing a nxunber of comedies and farces, 
and editina; The British Theatre, a collection of plays, in 25 vols., with biographical 
and critical remarks; also The Modern Theatre, in 10 vols. In 1791 and 1796, re- 
spectively, she published the two novels, A Simple Story, and I^ature and Art, by 
which she is best known to the general public. " If Mrs. Eadcliffe touched the trem- 
bling chords of the imagination, making wild music there, Mrs. Inchbald ha5 no less 
power over the spring of the heart. She not only moves the affections, but melts us 
into ' all the luxury of woe.' " — Hazlett 

Mes. Ha>^"ah Cowlet, 1743-1S09, had considerable repute as a dramatic writer at 
the close of the last century. Her principal pieces are the following:'* The Bnnaway, 
a Comedy; Who's the Dupe; The Belle's Stratagem: A Bold Stroke for a Hus- 
band. Fifteen of her plays are enumerated. Her poems are : The Siege of Acre; The 
Maid of Arragon ; The Scottish Tillage. 

Mes. Mabt Tighe, ISIO, daughter of the Rev. Wm. Blackford, and wife of 

Henry Tighe, Member of Piirliament from Woodstock, Ireland, wrote a poem, called 
Psyche, in six cantos, in the Spenserian stanza, highly commended by Sir James Mack- 
intosh and others. She was the subject of a poem by Mrs. Hemans, " The Grave of a 
Poetess," and of a beautiful lyric by More, " I saw thy Form in Youthful Prime,"' 



THE POETS. 333 

and is perhaps as much known by these tributes as by her own poems, although the 
latter undoubtedly have considerable merit. 

L-VDT Anne Barxard, 1750-1825, of a noble Scottish family, is noted for being the 
author of the well-known ballad of Auld Robin Gray, and for keeping the authoi'- 
ship a secret for more than fifty years. It was finally disclosed to the world by Sir 
Walter Scott. 

Thomas Dermody, 1775-1802, a native of Ireland, gave evidence of poetical powers 
■when very young. His first publication was a volume of poems written when he was 
in his thirteenth year. He published afterw^ards The Rights of Justice, a political 
pamphlet ; The Battle of the Bards, a Poem : Peace, a Poem, etc. He fell into habits 
of intemperance, and died in poverty at the age of twenty-seven. 

Arthur Murphy, 1730-1805, a native of Ireland, was a playwright. He commenced 
life as a clerk in a banking-house, and was successively writer, actor, and barrister. 
His plays, chiefly comedies, are not marked by brilliant wit, but are considered good 
acting pieces, and are still given occasionally. Among them are Know Your Own 
Mind, All in the Wrong, How to Keep Him. Besides his plays. Murphy was also 
the author of a translation of Tacitus, which has some merit, and wrote the lives of 
Johnson and Garrick. 

Henry James Pye, LL.D., 1745-1813, a Member of Parliament, and afterwards police 
magistrate in the city of London, was educated at Oxford, and was a man of literary 
culture. He published Elegies, 4to ; The Art of War, a Poem ; Alfred, an F.pic Poem ; 
Terses on Social Subjects ; Six Olympic Odes of Pindar, translated into English verse ; 
The War Elegies of Tyrtaeus, translation of the Epigrams and Hymns of Homer ; 
Comments on the Commentators of Shakespeare ; The Democrat, 2 vols.; Summary of 
the Duties of a Justice of the Peace out of Sessions. 

Thomas Holcroft, 1744-1809, the son of a shoemaker in London, was at first a 
groom, then an actor, and then an author. He wrote a number of plays, poems, novels 
and translations from the French and German. The best known of his plaj"S are Du- 
plicity,' The School for Arrogance, the Road to Ruin, the Deserted Daughter: of his 
novels, Alwyn, Hugh Trevor, Brj-an Perdue; of his translations, Caroline of Lichfield, 
Life of Frederic, Baron Trenck, Posthumous Works of Frederic II., of Prussia, Lava- 
ter's Essay on Physiognomy, Goethe's Hermann and Dorothea. He also published an 
account of his travels through Holland and Westphalia, and 3 vols, of his autobiogra- 
phy. His plays are successful stage-pieces, well arranged for action and scenic effect, 
although the style is that of the eighteenth century, with its slang phrases, roinantic 
damsels, and philosophic waiting maids. 

Richard Gall, 1776-1801. an Edinburgh printer, who died early, had considerable 
reputation as a poet, especially as a writer of songs. A longer poem, Arthurs Seat, is 
highly commended. A volume of his Poems and Songs was published after his death. 
"Gall must henceforth stand on the list next to Burns, and by the side of Ram- 
say, Fergusson, Bruce, and Macneill. It is by his songs and short effusions that Gall's 
name is destined to live. There is nothing better or sweeter in the Scottisli language 
than some of tliese : and wherever Gall's songs are set to appropriate airs, it is easy, 
without the spirit of prophecy, to foretell their popularity. My only Joe and Deark 0, 
and tlie Furewell to Ayrshire, are known to every lover of modern Scottish song." — 
The Scolsmmi. 



334 cow PER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

John Hoole, 1727-1803, a native of London, and for nearly forty years clerk in the 
East India House, is chiefly known as a translator from the Italian. He rendered 
Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered, the dramas of Metastasio, Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, and 
produced one or two weak original dramas. " Mr. Hoole, the translator of Tasso and 
Ariosto, and in that capacity a noble transmuter of gold into lead."— ,Str ^^. Scott. 

William Bosc.vwen, 1752-18i1, a lawyer and a writer on law, is known to literature 
by a Translation of Iloi-ace into English Yerse ; The Progress of Satire; and a vol- 
ume of Original Poems. 

Charles Dibdin, 1745-1814, a song-writer, dramatist, and actor, 
wrote nearly twelve hundred sea-songs, which were very popular with 
British tars. 

" These Songs have been the solace of sailors in long voyages, in storms, in battles ; 
they have been quoted in mutinies, to the restoration of order and discipline." One 
of these songs. Poor Tom Bowling, is particularly commended. He wrote 47 dramatic- 
pieces ; also, A Complete History of the English Stage, 5 vols., 8vo.— Charles Dibdin, 
Jr., d. 1833, a son of the preceding, wrote also a number of songs and dramas. — Thom.as 
DiBDiN, 1771-1841, also a son of Charles, was, like his father and his brother, a song- 
writer and dramatist. He composed more than 1000 songs, and 39 dramatic pieces ; 
also, The Metrical History of England, 2 vols. ; and Reminiscences, 2 vols. 

John Philip Kemble, 1757-1823, brother of Charles and uncle of Mrs. Fanny Kera- 
ble, was the most celebrated actor of his times. He wrote several plays, which, how- 
ever, were never printed, altered many of Shakespeare's plays to adapt them to the 
stage, and published an Essay on Macbeth and Richard III. In 1780 he published a 
volume of Fugitive Pieces, which he soon endeavored to suppress. — Mrs. Marie The- 
EESE Kemble, 1774-1838, wife of Charles and mother of Fanny and Charles Mitchell 
Kemble, was the author of several comedies and interludes. 



II. THE DRAMATISTS. 

Sheridan. 

Richard Brinsley Butler SheridaD, 1751-1816, was a bril- 
liant Parliamentary orator. His chief distinction, however, 
was as a dramatist. In this respect, he is inferior to Shake- 
speare only. As mere acting plays, those of Sheridan are 
considered the best in the language. 

Early Career. — Sheridan was the son of Thomas Sheridan the lexi- 
cographer and actor. He was born in Dublin, and educated at Harrow. 
There young Sheridan was so backward as to be pronounced by some 
of his masters " an impenetrable dunce." Dr. Parr, however, then at 
Harrow, formed a different opinion. In 1772, Sheridan married the 
beautiful Miss Linley, then celebrated not only for her beauty, but for 
her singing. He began the study of law about this time, but was never 



THE DRAMATISTS. 335 

admitted to the bar. To support himself and his wife, he took to writ- 
ing plays. 

Authorship. — In 1775 appeared The Eivals, the first of a series of 
comedies that have made their author famous wherever the English 
language is spoken. The Duenna was produced before the close of 
1775 ; and in 1777 appeared The School for Scandal, his master- 
piece. In 1779 Sheridan produced The Critic. The Stranger, and 
Pizarro, which followed, are adaptations from the German of Kotzebue. 

In Parliament. — Sheridan's fame as an author was now at its height. But he 
was destined to win other laurels, equally great. Having attracted the attention of 
the Whig party, he gained a seat in Parliament, and was an active supporter of Fox. 
In 1788, during the impeachment of Warren Hastings, Sheridan delivered his two so- 
called Begum speeches, the first of which was pronounced by acclamation the most 
wonderful single speech ever made in Parliament. When the orator, until then com- 
paratively unknown, had finished, the House was a scene of utter commotion and ap- 
plause, cheering, and clapping of hands. So great was the confusion that no one else 
could be heard, and the House adjourned. It is greatly to be regretted that we have 
only a meagre and incorrect report of this wonderful performance. His other numer- 
ous speeches, able as they are, do not justify any such extraordinary fame. 

As a dramatist, Sheridan is among the very best that have written for the English 
stage. The great fault of them all is that they are too uniformly clever. Even the 
subordinate characters jest and banter, and there are no dull ones to relieve the lead- 
ing characters. For all that, no plays have been more steadily successful, and have 
made the reputation of more young actors, than The Rivals, The School for Scandal, 
and The Critic. The names of Sir Anthony Absolute, Bob Acres, Lydia Languish, 
Mrs. Malaprop, Joseph Surface, Mrs. Candor, and Lady Sneerwell, have become house- 
hold words. Sheridan's pieces are all good acting plays; sparkling with wit, they 
never allow impatience to attack the audience. The Rivals is written decidedly under 
the inspiration of Smollett, and The School for Scandal under that of Fielding. By- 
ron's opinion was that Sheridan had produced the best in every department upon 
which he had ventured — the best comedy (School for Scandal), the best drama (Beg- 
gar's Opera), the best farce (The Critic), the best address (the monologue on Garrick), 
and the best oration (the Begum speech). 

Sheridan was improvident and careless in his way of living, and died in great pecu- 
niary embarrassment. 

Thomas Sheridan, Jr., 1721-1788, father of Kichard Brinsley 
Sheridan, a native of Ireland, and educated at Trinity College, Dub- 
lin, was noted as an actor, a teacher of elocution, and a lexicographer. 

Thomas Sheridan frequently played in company with Garrick, at Drury Lane, and 
was manager of that theatie for three years. His published works on elocution and 
reading are numerous. The best known work, however, is his General Dictionary of 
the English Language. Its chief value consists in the careful attention which it gives 
to pronunciation. He was, in fact, like Walker, an orthoepist, rather than a lexi- 
cographer. 

Thomas Sheridan, Sr., 1684-1738, the grandfather of Richard Brinsley Sheridfin, a 
native of Ireland, educated at Trinity College, Dublin, published only two works, a 



336 cow PER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

metrical translation of the Philoctetes of Sophocles, and a prose Tersion of the Satires 
of Ferseus. He appears to have been a great ■\vit, punster, and merriment-maker of 
his day, and an intimate frieud of Swift. On the anniversary of the King's birthday', 
Sheridan, being chaplain to the Lord Lieutenant, chose for Ins text, "• SuflScient unto 
the day is the evil thereof,"' — a practical joke which cost him his chaplaincy. "Ill- 
starred, good-natured, and improvident, a punster, a quibbler, a fiddler, and a wit. 
Not a day passed without a rebus, an anagram, or a madrigal. His pen and his fid- 
dle-stick were in continual motion, and yet to little or no purpose." — Lord Cork. 

Mrs. Frances Sheridax, 1724-1766, the mother of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, 
daughter of Dr. Philip Chamberlain, was the author of several novels and plays. She 
appears to have been a very attractive woman, as both Parr and Dr. Johnson are em- 
phatic in her praises. Her Memoirs have been written by her grand-daughter, Alicia 
Lefanu. Her works are Memoirs of Miss Sidney Buddulph, a novel in three volumes- 
The Discovery, a comedy in which Garrick acted with success ; The Dupe, a Comedy ; 
and The History of Nourjahad, a Novel, afterwards dramatized by Sophie Lee. The 
Memoirs of Miss Sidney Buddulph were very popular in their day, and received great 
commendation from Johnson and others. The plot of Richard Brinsley Shei-idan s 
School for Scandal is taken from it, and 'it was also translated into French. 

Garrick* 

Dayid Gaeiiick, 1716-1779, the greatest of English actors, was 
also a man of letters, and was the intimate friend and associate of 
nearly all the great writers of England who were contemporary with 
him. 

In his youth Garrick went to school to Samuel Johnson, in Lichfield, and in 1736 
master and pupil w-ent to London together to seek their fortunes. Johnson became 
the autocrat among authors, Garrick the prince without a peer among actors. As 
author, Garrick wrote several dramatic pieces. The Lying Yalet, The Miss in her 
Teens, and the Clandestine Marriage ; and he altered a large number of others, be- 
sides writing numerous Epigrams, Odes, Songs, Prologues, Epilogues, etc. His Poet- 
ical Works have been published in 2 vols., 12mo ; and his Private Correspondence, in 
2 vols., 4to. 

Foote. 

Samuel Foote, 1722-1777, is sometimes called the " English Aris- 
tophanes." He wrote a large number of comedies for his own actmg, 
in a playhouse belonging to himself, The Little Theatre in the Hay- 
market. 

Foote's Dramatic Works have been published, in 4 vols., 8vo. There is nothing spe- 
cially notable in them, except their good-natured fun. In this respect, Foote was as 
irresistible in private as he was on the stage. " The first time I was in company with 
Foote was at Fitzherberfs. Having no good opinion of the fellow, I was resolved not 
to be pleased; and it is very diflBcult to please a man against his will. I went on 
eating my dinner pretty sullenly, affecting- not to mind him ; but the dog was so very 
comical that I was obliged to lay down my knife and fork, throw myself back in my 
chair, and fairly laugh it out. He was irresistible." — Dr. Johnson. 



THE DRAMATISTS. 337 

Colman. 

George Colman, 1733-1794, was an eminent dramatist and the- 
atrical manager, of the last century. 

Colman was born at Florence, where his father at that time was British Minister. 
He was entered at Westminster School, where he gave cigns of talent. From West- 
minster he went to Oxford, and thence to Lincoln's Inn to study law. But the bent 
of his mind was in another direction, and the law gave way to letters and the stage. 
He entered fully upon a theatrical career about the age of twenty-seven, and he con- 
tinued it to the end. He wrote a large number of plays for the stage ; he had a share 
in the proprietorship of Covent Garden; and he undertook the management of the 
Hay market. In 1789, at the age of fifty-six, he lost his reason, and he died about 
five years afterwards. 

Colnian's dramatic works fill 4 vols., 8vo. The names of some of the most success- 
ful plays are Polly Honeycomb, The Jealous Wife, etc. He translated the Comedies 
of Terence into English blank verse. He also translated Horace's Art of Poetry. Both 
these works show taste and scholarship. He contributed humorous papers to several 
periodicals. His miscellaneous writings fill 3 vols. 

Richard Glover, 1712-1785, was a London merchant, who, with- 
out the advantages of a University education, attained such proficiency 
in learning as to be styled by Warton " one of the best Greek scholars 
of his time." He was also famous in his day as a poet, and attained 
eminence as a politician, being several times elected to Parliament. 
It is not improbable that his Parliamentary influence had something 
to do with the extravagant applause given to him for his scholarship 
and his poetry, Fielding, Lyttleton, and others, who swelled the 
chorus, being of the same political party with him. 

Worhs. — Glover's principal publications are the following: Leonidas, a Poem, 
4to. celebrating the defence of Thermopylae ; The Atheniad, a Poem, a continuation 
of the Leonidas ; London, or the Progress of Commerce, a Poem, 4to ; Hosier's Ghost, 
a Ballad, written to excite the English against the Spaniards, and very sensational in. 
character; Boadicea, a Tragedj', performed for nine nights; Medea, a Tragedy, "writ- 
ten on the Greek model, and therefore unfit for the modern stage ; " Jason, a Tragedy, 
"requiring scenery of the most expensive kind, and never exhibited." 

" His Leonidas acquired extraordinary popularity in its day, and appears, like the 
pseudo-Ossian, to have obtained a higher, or, at least, a more lasting reputation on the 
continent than in its own country. The Atheniad was intended as a' sequel to Leoni- 
das, and embraces the remainder of the Persian war, from the death of Leonidas to 
the battle of Platea. It was the work of the author's old age, and its defects are, in 
part, attributable to the circumstance of its not having received his finishing hand. 
In this latter performance, accordingly, the abilities of the author show themselves 
more matured, and his peculiar properties more fully developed." — Retrospective 
Review. 

John Home, 1724-1808, acquired general celebrity by his play of 
Douglas. 

29 W 



338 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Home was a native of A-ncnim, Scotland. He was educated at the University of 
Edinburgh, and licensed to preach in the Church of Scotland. In 1757, he was obliged 
to withdraw from the ministry to avoid degradation, in consequence of having pub- 
lished, and had performed, his play of Douglas. His patron. Lord Bute, procured for 
him a pension and a sinecure office under the Government. Home served as a volun- 
teer against the Pretender in 1745. He was the author of several plays, none of which, 
except The Douglas^ met with any success. This last, a tragedy, was greeted with 
enthusiasm on the occasion of its first rendering, and has maintained its positiou ever 
since. Several of its scenes are iinsurpassed for effectiveness upon the stage. Besides 
his dramatic pieces, Home published, in 1802, A History of the Rebellion of 1745, which 
has its merits of style, but can scarcely be called a trustworthy historical work, and 
has been severely criticized even by some of Home's warmest admirers. 

Isaac Bickerstaff, 1735-1787, an Irish dramatic writer, produced a large number 
of plays. More than twenty are named. Three coniic pieces, Love in a Village, The 
Maid of the Mill, and Lionel and Clarissa, were particularly successful. 

Rev. Samuel Bishop, 1731-1795, a clergyman, schoolmaster, and poet, published sev- 
eral poetical works, but is chiefly known as the author of the farce of High Life below 
Stairs, often attributed to Garrick. 



III. MISCELLANEOUS PROSE ^A/'RITERS. 

Hannah More. 

Hannah More, 1745-1833, was a "bright particular star" 
in the firmament of letters all through three of the periods 
marked in the present treatise, those, namely, of Johnson, 
Cowper, and Walter Scott. But she culminated during the 
last ten years of the eighteenth century, and to that period 
accordingly she has been assigned. 

Though never married, she acquired by courtesy, in her 
later years, the title of 2Irs. Hannah More, according to a 
beautiful usage not then extinct in England. She wrote 
much both in verse and prose, but distinguished herself 
chiefly in the latter. 

Of all writers of her day, of either sex, none exerted by 
their writings a purer influence ; and she is entitled to last- 
ing remembrance for the services which she rendered in 
improving and elevating the standard of private morals. 
She was pre-eminently the moralist of her generation. 

Hannah More's earliest productions were dramatic. Among them 
are The Search after Happiness, The Inflexible Captive, Percj, and 



MISCELLAN"EOUS PEOSE WRITERS. 339 

The Fatal Falsehood, She then abandoned writing for the stage, as 
inconsistent with her Christian character, but, like Racine, produced 
some sacred dramas, as Belshazzar, Daniel, and numerous poems. 
She is best known bv her Moral Tales and her Contributions to the 
Cheap Repository Tracts. Among the latter is the famous Shepherd 
of Salisbury Plain. Among the former is Coelebs in Search of a Wife. 
She also wrote several essays, the principal of which are Strictures on 
the Modern System of Female Education, and Hints towards forming 
the Character of a Young Princess (for Charlotte, Princess of Wales). 

" It would be idle in us to dwell here on works so well known as the Thoughts on 
the Manners of the Great, the Essay on the Religion of the Fashionable World, and so 
on, which finally established Miss More's name as a great moral writer, possessing a 
masterly command over the resources of our language, and devoting a keen wit and a 
lively fancy to the best and noblest of purposes. . . .She did, perhaps, as much real 
good in her generation as any woman that ever held the pen." — iowdoji Quarterly. 

Mrs. Piozzi. 

Mbs. Hester Lynch Piozzi, 1740-1821, is known by her poem The 
Three Warning, and by her Recollections of Dr. Johnson. 

Mrs. Piozzi was a native of Wales. Her maiden name was Salisbury ; she married 
Henry Thrale, and, afterwards, in 1781, Gabriel Piozzi, an Italian. During the life- 
time of her first husband, Dr. Johnson was an intimate friend of the family. Mrs. 
Piozzi published a number of fugitive poems, the best known of which is The Three 
Warnings, and a fewmiscellaneousworks. She is principally known, however, by her 
Recollections of Dr. Johnson, published in 1796, and her Letters to and from Dr. John- 
son. Her Recollections are pretentious and triiiing, but narrate many incidents of 
interest in the great lexicographer's life. 

Madame D'Arblay. 

;Mada3IE Frances D'Arblay, 1752-1840, daughter and biographer 
of the great historian of music, Dr. Bumey, lived to the extreme age 
of eighty-eight, wliich brings her in one sense within the present gene- 
ration. But her main activity was in the eighteenth century, and she 
belongs really to the times of Johnson, Burke, Cowper, and Hannah 
More. 

Fanny was a shy, sensitive child, and at the age of eight did not know her letters. 
Her mother dying when Fanny was ten, and her father from over-indulgence not put- 
ting her under the control of a tutor, she grew up into womanhood prettj' much "ac- 
cording to her own sweet will." The musical reputation of Dr. Burney made his house 
the resort of all the great men of letters, Johnson, Bnrke, Garrick, and others, and it 
was the brilliant conversation of these men that first gave a stimulus to the thoughts 
of the reserved, but all-observing girL 



340 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Evelina, her first work, was written, according to her own account, when she was 
about seventeen or eighteen. She kept the composition of it entirely to herself for 
several years, and then sent it anonymously to Dodsley. As he refused to publish it 
on those conditions, she finally sold him the manuscript for £20. It was at once 
extremely popular, and gained the applause of the highest critics then known to the 
nation. " She found herself on the highest pinnacle of fame." — Macaulay. Cecilia, 
which followed almost four years later, did not disappoint the high expectations 
raised by the first. " It was placed, by general acclamation, among the classical works 
of England." — Macaulay. 

Miss Burney had the ill-fortune, soon after, to be appointed, at her father's request, 
to the post of the Keeper of Robes to Queen Charlotte. The life to which she was 
here subjected, was one peculiarly uusuited to her sensitive nature ; and though 
treated with gentle kindness by her royal patrons, she felt the position to be an 
intolerable bondage. She was married in 1793 to a French officer, Count D'Arblay, 
and in 1802 she accompanied him to Paris, where she remained until his death, in 
1812. Her remaining years were spent in England. 

Besides the works already mentioned, she published Edwin and Elgitha, a Tragedy ; 
Camilla, which brought her three thousand guineas ; and The Wanderer, a Tale, 
which brought £1500. She wrote also a Memoir of her father. Dr. Burney, in 3 vols. 
The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay were published after her death, in 7 
vols., 8vo, and created considerable sensation on account of the eminent character of 
the persons among whom she had moved, and the unreserved nature of her observa- 
tions. 

" Miss Burney did for the English novel what Jeremy Collier did for the English 
drama. She first showed that a tale might be written in which both the fashionable 
and the vulgar life of London might be exhibited with great force, and with broad 
comic humor, and which yet should not contain a single line inconsistent with rigid 
morality, or even with virgin delicacy. She took away the reproach which lay on a 
most useful and delightful species of composition. She vindicated the right of her sex 
to have an equal share in a fair and noble promise of letters. Burke had sat up all 
night to read her writings, and Johnson had pronounced her superior to Fielding, 
when Rogers was still a school-boy, and Southey still in petticoats." — Macaulay. 

Macaulay's judgment is not always equal to his rhetoric. The following estimate 
probably comes nearer to the truth : 

" Her works are deficient in original vigor of conception, and her characters in depth 
and nature. Sbe has considered so anxiously the figured silks and tamboured muslins 
which fiutter about society, that she has made the throbbings of the heart which they 
cover a secondary consideration. Fashion passes away, and the manners of the great 
are unstable, but natural emotion belongs to immortality." — Allan Cunningham. 

Charles Burney, 1726-1814, father of Fanny Burney, already 
noticed, published in 1773 a History of Music, which is still a stand- 
ard on the subject of which it treats. 

Burney's work was A General History of Music, from the earliest periods down to 
the time of writing. Dr. Burney (he received from Oxford the unusual degree of Doc- 
tor of Music) was eminent as a musician and a writer of music ; but gained his chief 
distinction by becoming the historian of the science. He wrote other things, but this 
was the chief. '-Dr. Burney gave dignity to the character of the modern musician, by 
joining to it that of the scholar and philosopher." — Sir William Jones. 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WRITEES. 341 

James Burnet, 1739-1821, Rear- Admiral of the British Navy, and son of Dr. Burney 
the histoi-ian of music, compiled A Chronological History of the Discoveries in the 
South Seas, or Pacific Ocean, with a History of the Buccaneers of America, 5 vols., 4to ; 
A Chronological History of North-Eastern Voyages of Discovery ; and other works. 



Mrs. Radeliffe. 

Mjrs. Anna Radcliffe, 1764-1823, attained great temporary dis- 
tinction as a novelist. One of lier novels, The Mysteries of Udolpho, 
is unparalleled in its kind in English literature. 

Mrs. Radeliffe travelled a little on the continent, but otherwise seems to have passed 
her time in country retirement. Even after she had become famous as a novelist, she 
did not suifer herself to be attracted by the society of London. 

Few writers aftbrd a more signal instance of the untrustworthiness of the adage, 
voxpqpuli vox Dei. About the beginning of this century Mrs. Radeliffe was one of the 
bright stars of the literary firmament, admired not merely by the vulgar worshippers 
of the novel, but by men of unquestioned genius. Sir "Walter Scott, Talfourd, Dr. 
Warren, Byron, were among her enthusiastic readers. Yet so completely has the 
popular fancy changed, and the love of the unnatural and horrible been replaced by 
a taste for what is healthier, at least more life-like, that Mrs. Radeliffe is scarcely 
known to the public except by name, and scarcely read except by the professional stu- 
dent of literature. Her truly great contemporaries have waxed more and more in 
brightness, while she herself has waned into the obscurity of the upper shelves of the 
circulating library. 

Mrs. Radcliffe's first work. The Castles of Athlin and Dunbane, 1789, was not suc- 
cessful. It Avas followed by A Sicilian Romance, and The Romance of the Forest, 
which established her fame. Her greatest work, however, and that by which she is 
almost exclusively known, is The Mysteries of Udolpho, 1794. Her next novel was 
The Italian, a story of the confessional. Gaston de Blondeville, and one or two other 
pieces, were published posthumously, in 1826, by Talfourd. Her poems also were col- 
lected and published at the same time. 

"Her descriptions of scenery are vague and wordy to the last degree; they are 
neither like Salvator nor Claude, nor nature nor art ; her characters are insipid, — the 
shadows of a shade, continued on, under different names, through all her novels; her 
story comes to nothing. But in harrowing up the soul with imaginary horrors, and 
making the flesh creep and the nerves thrill with fond hopes and fears, she is unri- 
valled among her fair countrywomen. Her great power lies in describing the inde- 
finable, and embodying a phantom. . . . She has all the poetrj' of Romance, all that is 
obscure, visionary, and objectless in the imagination." — Haditt. 

Mrs. Charlotte Lexxox, 1720-1804, -was a native of New York, 
daughter of Col. James Ramsay, Lieutenant-Governor of that city. 
She was sent to London for her education, and remained there, main* 
taining herself by the use of her pen. She was on friendly terms with 
the novelist Richardson, with Dr. Johnson, and other celebrities. Dr. 
Johnson ranked her with Hannah More and Fanny Burney, which 
was evidently an overestimate. 
29* 



342 COWPEK AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

The following are Mrs. Lennox's principal productions : The Female Quixote, 2 vols. ; 
Henrietta, a Novel, 2 vols. ; Sophia, a Novel, 2 vols. ; Euphemia, a Novel, 4 vols. ; Me- 
moir of Harriet Stuart ; Memoir of Henry Lennox ; Shakespeare Illustrated, 3 vols. ; 
Philander, a Dramatic Pastoral ; The Sisters, a Comedy ; Old City Manners, a Comedy; 
Poems. She translated also from the French, Father Brumoy's Greek Theatre, 3 vols., 
4to ; The Duke of Sully's Memoirs, 3 vols., 4to ; and the Memoirs of Madame Mainte- 
non, and of the Countess of Berci, etc. 

Elizabeth Hamilton, 1758-1816, was a writer of great celebrity 
about the beginning of the present century. Sir Walter Scott was a 
particular admirer of her writings. 

The principal works of Mrs. Hamilton are the following : Letters of a Hindoo Rajah ; 
Memoirs of Modern Philosophers ; Letters on Education ; Letters on the Moral and 
Religious Principle; The Cottagers of Glenburnie. The last named is considered her 
best. 

" We have not met with anything nearly so good as this, since we read Castle 
Rackrent and the Popular Tales of Miss Edgeworth. This contains as admirable a 
picture of the Scottish peasantry as do those of the Irish; and rivals them not only in 
the general truth of the delineations, and in the cheerfulness and practical good sense 
of the lessons they convey, but in the nice discrimination of national character, and 
the skill with which a dramatic representation of humble life is saved from caricature 
and absurdity." — Sir Walter Scott. 

Mrs, Charlotte Smith, 1749-1806, wrote a large number of works, 
of which the one now best known is The Old Manor House. 

She was married at the early age of fifteen to Mr. Benjamin Smith, a merchant en- 
gaged in the West India trade. The improvident speculations and extravagance of 
Mr. Smith threw upon Mrs. Smith the support of herself and her children, twelve in 
number, and this she undertook, as many other mothers have done, by the use of her 
pen. Mrs. Smith, her writings and her fortunes, figure in Walter Scott's Lives of the 
Novelists, Leigh Hunt's Men, Women, and Books, Julia Kavanagh's English Women 
of Letters, and many other works of a like kind. 

Mrs. Smith wrote the following works : Emmeline, the Orphan of the Castle, Ethe- 
linda, the Ruler of the Lake, Celestina, Desmond, Moutalbert, Marchmant, The Young 
Philosopher, The Banished Man, and The Old Manor House. The last named is con- 
sidered her best. 

She published several volumes of poetry : Elegiac Sonnets and other Essays ; The 
Emigrants; and Beachy Head, etc. Other works of hers are Romance and Real Life, 
a collection of interesting and well authenticated facts; Rural Works; Minor Morals, 
with Sketches of Natural History ; Conversations on Natural History ; Natural His- 
tory of Birds, etc. 

Ladt Eleanor Fenn, 1744-1813, wrote numeroiis educational works, under the as- 
sumed name of Mrs. Lovechild: The Child's Grammar; The Mother's Grammar; 
Parsing Lessons for Elder Pupils; Grammatical Amusements; Sunday Miscellany; 
Short Sermons for Young Persons, etc. 

Sir John Fenn, 1739-1794, an antiquary, made a collection of original Letters, writ- 
ten by members of the Paston family, during the reigns of Henry YL, Edward lY., 



MISCELLANEOUS PKOSE WRITERS. 343 

Richard III., and Henry VII. These Paston Letters fill 5 vols., 4to, and are considered 
of great value in elucidating the manners of the people during a most interesting 
period of history. "I am now reading the Paston Letters, written in the wars of 
York and Lancaster, and am greatly entertained with them. Their antique air, their 
unstudied communication of the modes of those old times, with their undoubted 
authenticity, render them highly interesting, curious, and informing." — Madame 
D'Arblay's Diary. 

Mrs. Sarah Trimmer, 1741-1810, daughter of Joshua J. Kirby, and wife of Mr. 
Trimmer, was born at Ipswich. She was the author of a large number of works, 
chiefly educational and religious. The following are some of them: Teacher's Assist- 
ant, 2 vols : The Economy of Charity ; Outline of Ancient History ; Outline of Roman 
History ; History of England ; Help to the Unlearned in the Study of the Holy Scrip- 
tures ; Instructive Tales ; History of the Robins, etc. 

Mrs. Catharine Macaulay, 17.33-1791, was a writer of some notoriety. She wrote 
on historical, moral, and political subjects, and was an avowed repuMican. She was 
so much of a partisan that her historical writings are regarded as of doubtful credit. 
She wrote A History of England from the Accession of James II. to that of the 
Brunswick Line, S vols., 4to ; A History of England from the Revolution to the Pres- 
ent Time,- only one volume finished; Moral Truth, 8vo ; Letters on Education, ito ; 
several political pamphlets. This lady does not appear to have been connected with 
the great historian of the same name, who in our d.aj^ has gone over similar historical 
ground. But in the sharp passage at arms between him and J. Wilson Croker, the 
latter points his sting in the following style : " Catharine, though now forgotten by 
an ungrateful public, made quite as much noise in her day as Thomas does in ours." 

Rev. Atjlat Macaulay, 1797, a Scotchman, educated at the University of Glas- 
gow, and uncle to Thomas Babington Macaulay, wrote Essays on Various Subjects of 
Taste and Criticism ; Peculiar Advantages of Sunday-Schools, etc. 



Mackenzie. 

Henry Mackenzie, 1745-1831, is well known as a sentimental 
writer of this period, his Man of Feeling being an acknowledged clas- 
sic in that line. 

Mackenzie was born in Edinburgh, and educated at the University of that city. 
He practised law, and was appointed Comptroller of Taxes for Scotland. Macken- 
zie's house was a meeting-place for the select literary and political men of the day. 
He himself was the author of many works and sketches, which have lost somewhat 
of their first reputation, but are still read and admired. 

Mackenzie's principal works are : The Man of Feeling, the Man of the World, 
Julia de Roubigne. Besides these larger works, he contributed a great number of 
papers to The Lounger, The Mirror, and other periodicals. He was also a member of 
the Committee appointed by tlie Highland Society to examine into the authenticity 
of the Ossian Poems. Mackenzie's style resembles closely that of Sterne, and his 
writings are nearly all of the sentimental order. They are superior to Sterne's in 
purity of morals, but are decidedly inferior in vigor of invention and play of humor. 
Mackenzie's short stories are beautifully told. 



344 cowPEja and his contempoeaeies. 

William Smellie, 1740-1795, was a prominent Scotcli printer, 
publisher, writer, and naturalist, of the last century, residing in Edin- 
burgh. 

One of Smellie's earliest feats was the setting up and correcting of the so-called 
"immaculate edition " of Terence. He wrote a good part of the first edition of the 
Encyclopedia Britannica, and edited for three years the old Edinburgh Magazine and 
Review, translated Bufifon's Natural History, and Natural History of Birds, and wrote 
the Philosophy of Natural History, and the lives of John Gregory, Henry Home, 
Lord Kames, David Hume, and Adam Smith. Besides these, and some other gene- 
ral works, Smellie was the author of numerous miscellaneous contributions to the 
periodicals. 

James Tytler, 17-17-1801, was a Scottish surgeon who emigrated to America during 
the troublous times of the early French Revolution. His works are very miscella- 
neous in their nature, being partly theological, partly medical, and partly literary. 
He published a Poetical Translation of the Eclogues of Virgil, a Letter on the Doc- 
trine of Assurance, an Answer to Paine's Age of Reason, a Treatise on the Plague and 
Yellow Fever, and other works. 

John Howard, 1726-1790, the philanthropist, was the son of a wealthy tradesman 
of London, and inherited a large fortune. His labors and sufferings in exploring and 
exposing the horrors of the public prisons of England and Europe are well known. 
His only publication of any size was The State of the Prisons in England and Wales. 
The shocking condition of things there revealed made a lasting impression on the 
public mind. 

Thomas Paine. 

Thomas Paine, 1736-1809, a political and infidel writer of the last 
century, acquired great temporary notoriety, partly by his connection 
with the American and the French Bevolutions, and partly by the 
reckless hardihood of his writings. 

Paine was born at Thetford, England, of Quaker parentage, and was brought up to 
the trade of a stay-maker. At the age of twenty -four he removed to London, and was 
employed as a school-teacher. In London he met with Franklin, and in 1744, at 
the suggestion of the latter, emigrated to Philadelphia. He sympathized warmly 
with the Americans in the contest with Great Britain, and in January 1776 published 
the pamphlet. Common Sense, which made a prodigious sensation, and helped doubt- 
less to precipitate the crisis which took place on the 4th of July following. During 
the depressing winter of 1776-7, he began the publication of a periodical called The 
Crisis, the object of which was to encoui'age the patriots. It appeared at irregular in- 
tervals for several years, and was eminently successful. The phrase, " These are the 
times that try men's souls," originated in The Crisis. 

Paine was Secretai-y to the Committee on Foreign Affairs, of the Continental Con- 
gress, from April 1777 to January 1779, and in 1781 he went to France with Col. Lau- 
rens, to uegotiHte a loan for the United States. On his retiringfrom the service of the 
United States, in 1785, he was rewarded by a gift of $3000 and the confiscated estate 
of a royalist near New Rochelle, in New York, consisting of three hundred acres of 
land. In 1787, Paine returned to France on his own affairs, and in 1791 to London. 

The terrible fei'ment of the Erench Revolution was of j ust the kind to awaken his 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WRITERS. 345 

active sympathies, and in 1791-2 he published in London The Rights of Man, in reply 
to Burke and in advocacy of the most extreme views of the French Republicans. The 
book had an enormous sale. Its views were so levelling and disorganizing in their 
scope, and its effect was so great upon the lower classes in Great Britain, who were 
already in an unsettled and dangerous condition, that the Government was alarmed, 
and caused Paine to be prosecuted for sedition and libel. He was found guilty, but 
escaped to France, where he was naturalized, and became a member of the National 
Convention. He was afterwards excluded from the Convention by Robespierre, and 
was imprisoned for nearly a year. 

In 1794-5, Paine published in London and Paris The Age of Reason, being a scurril- 
ous attack on Christianity. The manuscript of the first part having been submitted 
to Franklin before publication, Franklin returned it with this answer : " I advise you 
not to attempt unchaining the tiger, but to burn this piece before it is seen by any other 
person, whereby you will save yourself a great deal of mortification from the enemies 
it may raise you, and perhaps a good deal of regret and repentance. If men are so 
wicked with religion, what would they be without it? " 

These words of Franklin seem to have been prophetic. In 1802, Paine, writing to 
an infidel friend, said, " I am sorry that that work ever went to press. I wrote it more 
for my own amusement, and to see what I could do, than with any design of benefit- 
ing the world. I would give worlds, had I them at my command, had The Age of 
Reason never been published. ... I regret the publication of that work exceedingly. 
It can never do the world any good, and its sarcastic style will doubtless lead thou- 
sands to esteem lightly the only book of correct morals that has ever blessed the 
•world." 

Paine was a shallow man, whose knowledge was infinitesimal in proportion as his 
effrontery was infinite. The sensation that he produced was due to the peculiar cir- 
cumstances of the crisis in which he lived, more than to the ability of the man. His 
conceit of himself and of what he had done, was of a piece with the rest of his career. 
He really believed that he had given the death-blow to Christianity. " I have now 
gone through the Bible as a man would go through a wood, with an axe on his 
shoulder, to fell trees. Here they lie ; and the priests, if they can, may replant them. 
They may perhaps stick them in the ground, but they will never make them grow." 

Paine returned to the United States in 1802, and died finally in the city of New York, 
in great obscurity, his closing years being marked by the coarsest profligacy and in- 
temperance. 

Godwin. 

William Godwin, 1756-1836, is chiefly known by three 
works of an entirely different character : A Life of Chaucer, 
in two ponderous quarto volumes ; the novel of Caleb Wil- 
liams, in which the element of the terrible' was employed 
with a power hardly equalled elsewhere in English litera- 
ture ; and an abstruse work on Political Justice, in which 
the attempt was made to undermine the entire fabric of 
society, morals, and religion. 

Career. — Godwin was the son of a Dissenting minister, and was him- 
self, for some years, minister to a Dissenting congregation. But at 



346 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

the age of twenty-six he abandoned the ministry, and gave himself up 
to literature as a profession, making London his permanent residence. 
He was married somewhat late in life, 1797, at the age of forty-one, 
to the notorious Mary Wollstonecraft, and after her death was mar- 
ried a second time. He was for some years a bookseller, and a prin- 
cipal conductor of the New Annual Register. 

Godwin's writings are numerous, and are of several distinct kinds, 
philosophical, political, fictitious, biographical, and poetical, and in 
each he achieved distinction, though of a sort hardly to be envied. 

An Inquiry concerning Political Justice, 2 vols., 4to, was published in 1793, and 
excited in thoughtful minds a degree of alarm approaching to consternation. It was 
abstruse and unattractive in form and style, but in its principles it threatened to upset 
all the established foundations of society and civil government ; and the feverish state 
of the public mind, consequent upon the French Revolution, gave the book a degree 
of notoriety and power which at any other time it would never have received. " No 
work of our time gave such a blow to the philosophical mind of the country as the cel- 
ebrated Inquiry concerning Political Justice. Tom Paine was considered for the time 
a Tom Fool to him ; Paley an old woman ; Edmund Burke a flashy sophist." — Hazlitt. 
" This was a bold and astounding piece of levelization, pardonable only as having 
been conceived in the madness of a distracting period in the history and affairs of 
Europe. It became so popular that the poorest mechanics were known to club sub- 
scriptions for its purchase, and thus was it directed to mine and eat away contentment 
from a nation's roots." — Lond. Gent. Mag. 

Godwin wrote also The Enquirer, Reflections on Education, Manners, and Literature ; 
On Population, being an Inquiry concerning the Power of Increase in the Numbers of 
Mankind, a reply to Malthus ; Thoughts on Man, his Nature, Productions, and Dis- 
coveries ; Letters of Verax to the Morning Chronicle on the Present War (1815), and 
several other political pamphlets. 

Godwin's first novel, Caleb Williams, created as much of a sensation 
as his Political Justice. It involves a dark mystery, and deals largely 
in the tragic and the terrible. 

" Caleb Williams, the earliest, is also the most popular, of our author's romances, 
not because Lis latter works have been less rich in sentiment and passion, but because 
they are, for the most part, confined to the development of single characters; while 
in this there is the opposition and death-grapple of two beings, each endowed with 
poignant sensibilities and quenchless energy. There is no work of fiction which more 
rivets the attention — no tragedy which exhibits a struggle more sublime or suffer- 
ings more intense than this ; yet to produce the effect, no complicated machinery is 
employed, but the springs of action are few and simple. The motives are at once com- 
mon and elevated, and are purely intellectual, without appearing for an instant inade- 
quate to their mighty issues." — Sir T. K. Talfourd. 

"Caleb Williams is the cream of his mind, the rest are the skimmed milk; yet in 
that wondrous novel all must be offended with the unnatural and improbable char- 
acter of Falkland ; the most accomplished, the most heroical and lofty-minded of men, 
murders one who had affronted him, allows others to hang for the deed, and persecutes 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 347 

to the brink of ruin a man -svliose sole sin was a desire to penetrate tlirough the mystery 
in which this prodigy of vice and virtue had wrapped -himself."' — Allan Cunmngliam. 

Godwin's other works of fiction are : St. Leon, a Tale of the Sixteenth Century ; 
Mandeville, a Tale of the Seventeenth Century ; Fleetwood, or The New Man of Feel- 
ing; and Cloudesley, a novel. lie made two attempts at dramatic composition : An- 
tonio, or The Soldier's Return, a Tragedy ; Faulkner, a Tragedy. Both were hooted 
cfi" the stage. 

In biography and history, Godwin wrote The Life of Geoffrey Chaucer, 2 vols., 4to, 
a most unwieldy, lumbering performance ; Life of the Earl of Chatham ; Lives of Ed- 
ward and John Phillips, nephews and pupils of Milton ; History of the Commonwealth 
of England, 4 vols., Svo ; Sketches of History ; Lives of the Xecromancers ; Memoirs of 
Mary TV'ollstonecraft Godwin. 

" In his life of Mary Wollstonecraft he has written little and said much ; and in his 
account of Chaucer, he has written much and said little. It has been said that a spoon- 
ful of truth will color an ocean of fiction ; and so it is seen in Godwin's Life of Chau- 
cer ; he heaps conjecture upon conjecture, — dream upon dream, — theory upon theory ; 
scatters learning all around, and shows everywhere a deep sense of the merits of the 
poet ; yet all that he has related might have been told in a twentieth part of the space 
which he has taken." — Allan Cunningham. 

" The perusal of this title excited no small surprise in our critical fraternity. The 
authenticated passages of Chaucer's life may be comprised in half a dozen pages; and 
behold two voluminous quartos I "We have said that Mr. Godwin had two modes of 
■wire-drawing and prolonging his narrative. The first is, as we have seen, by looking 
in the description and history of everything that existed upon earth at the time of 
Chaucer. In this kind of composition, we usually lose sight entirely of the proposed 
subject of Mr. Godwin's lucubrations, travelling to Rome or to Palestine with as little 
remorse as if poor Chancer had never been mentioned in the title-page. The second 
mode is considerably more ingenious, and consists in making old Geofl'rey accompany 
the author upon these striking excursions. For example, Mr. Godwin has a fancy to 
describe a judicial trial. Nothing can be more easily introduced ; for Chaucer cer- 
tainly studied at the Temple, and is supposed to have been bred to the bar."— >Sir 
Walter Scott. 

Mar-y Wollstoneeraft. 

Mary Wollstoxeceaft, aftenvards ]\fe. Godwin, 1759-1797, was 
notorious in her dar, partly by the ii-regularities of her life, and partly 
by her "writings, 'vvhich were not without substantial merit, and which 
provoked discussion by their unfeminiae freedom of style and 
thought. 

She was for a time engaged in teaching school in the neighborhood of London, and 
then for a time was governess in a family of rank. In 17SG, being then twenty-seven 
years old, she began authorship, and published successively Thoughts on the Educa- 
tion of Daughters ; Mary, a Fiction ; Original Stories from Real Life ; Tiie Female 
Reader; Salzman's Elements of Morality and Lavater's Physiognomy, translated and 
abridged; Answer to Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution ; Vindication of 
the Rights of "Women ; Moral and Historical Tiew of the French Pie volution ; Letters 
from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, etc» 



348 COWPER AXD HIS COXT E MPOE A EIES . 

She was married at the age of thirty-seven to Godwin the novelist, and died the 
year following, leaving an infant daughter, who became the wife of the poet Percy 
Byshe Shellej'. 

" No woman (with the exception of the greatest woman, Madame de Stael.) has 
made any impression on the public mind during the last fifty years to be compared 
•with Mrs Godwin. This was, perhaps, more especially true in the provinces, Avhere 
her new and startling doctrines were received with avidity, and acted upon in some 
particulars to a considerable extent, particularly by married women. She was, I have 
been told by an intimate friend, very pretty and feminine in manners and person ; 
much attached to those very observances which she decries in her works; so that if 
any gentleman did not fly to open the door as. she approached it, or take up tbehand- 
kercliief which she dropped, she showered on him the full weight of reproach and 
displeasure; an inconsistency she would have doubtless despised in a disciple." — EU- 
woocTs Literary Ladks of England. 

Theobald Wolfe Tone. 

Theobald Wolfe Toxe, 1763-1798, is more celebrated as a man 
tlian as an author. 

Tone's political writings, together with an account of his life, were published after 
his death by his son, William T. W. Tone, in 1S2G. Tone published in 1790 a pamphlet, 
very bitter in its spirit, on the policy of the English Government of England, and also 
founded the Society of United Irishmen. lie was one of the victims of English ter- 
rorism in Ireland at the close of the last century, was sentenced to death for treason, 
but escaped the execution of the sentence by cutting his throat in prison. His son, 
the editor of his writings, served in the French armj- under Napoleon, and, after the 
downfall of the empire, emigrated to America and joined the army of the United 
States. 

John Lons De Lolme, 1745-1S07, a native of Switzerland, resided some years in 
England, and while there wrote several works, chiefly on public affairs : A Parallel 
between the English Government and the Former Government of Sweden; The Con- 
stitution of England : Strictures on the Union of Scotland with England : History of 
the Flagellants, etc. De Lolme was a great admirer of the English Constitution. 

Thomas Day, 1748-1789, was a lawyer by profession, but having by inheritance an 
ample fortune, he never engaged in practice. He was focd of literary pursuits, and 
wrote a good deal both in prose and verse. His writings were mostly in advocacy of 
political and social reforms. He took the part of the Americans in the controversy 
between the Colonies and the mother country, and he was strongly opposed to African 
slavery. His publications are the following: The Devoted Legions, a Poem against 
the War with America; The Desolation of America, a Poem ; Letters of Marius; Re- 
flections on the Present State of England and the Independence of America ; The 
Dying Negro ; The History of Little Jack ; The History of Sandford and Merton. The 
work last named was the most popular of all, and has acquired a permanent place in 
English literature, 

John Millek, 173.5-1801, a native of Scotland, was educated at Glasgow University, 
and was afterwards professor in the legal faculty of that institution. His two prin- 
cipal works are: Observations on the Origin and Distinction of Ranks in Society, and 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 349 

an Historical View of the English Government, etc. Tlie lutter Avork is very unequal, 
is prolix, and the author is otten carried away too much by his theories. With all its 
defects, however, it is an important contribution to English pohtical history, and still 
retains its value. 

Thomas Pownall, 1722-1805, was actively engaged for a long time in American 
affairs, being Secretary to the Commissioners for Trade and Plantations, then Governor 
successively of Massachusetts, New Jersey, and South Carolina, and finally returning 
to England in 1761. He steadily opposed the war against the Colonies, and predicted 
the result of the measures of the British Government. He wrote much on public 
affairs. The following are some of Governor PownalFs publications : Administration 
of the Colonies ; Principles of Polity ; A Memorial Addressed to the Sovereigns of 
Europe ; Letter to Adam Smith respecting his Wealth of Nations, etc. 

Grantille Sharp, 1734-1813, was a philanthropist and a man of 
varied learning. 

Sharp held a position in the Ordnance Office at the time of the AmeT-ican Revolu- 
tionary War, but he disapproved so strongly of the measures of the British Govern- 
ment that he resigned his oflBce rather than participate in any way in the prosecution 
of the war. The remainder of his life was devoted to philanthropic objects and to 
Istters. His publications were numerous, and many of them of an elegant and schol- 
arly character. The following are the titles of a few : Remarks on the Use of the Defi- 
nite Article in the Greek Text of the New Testament ; Short Treatise on the English 
Tongue; Ancient Divisions of the English Nation into Hundreds and Tithings ; Dec- 
laration of the People's Natural Right to a Share in the Legislature ; The Law of 
Liberty ; The. Law of Nature ; Slavery in England ; On Duelling ; Remarks on Several 
very Important Prophecies ; On Babylon ; On Jerusalem ; On Melchisedec, etc. 

Charles Jenkinson, Earl of Liverpool, 1727-1808, in consequence 
of his abilities as a statesman, was created, first Lord Hawkesbury, and 
afterwards Earl of Liverpool. 

He wrote several works, mostly pertaining to statesmanship : National and Consti- 
tutional Force in England ; Treaties between Great Britain and Other Powers, 3 vols., 
8vo; Discourse on the Conduct of Great Britain in respect to Neutral Nations, 3 vols., 
8vo, translated into most of the languages of Europe ; Treatise on the Coins of the 
Realm ; Life of Simon Lord Gresham. 

Et. Hon. Wm. Wyndham, 1750-1810, was a conspicuous statesman 
and Parliamentary orator. 

He was born in London, and was educated at Glasgow and at Oxford; he sat in 
Parliament from 1782 to 1810. His Speeches in Parliament have been published, with 
some account of his Life, by Thomas Amyot, in 3 vols., 8vo. 

" He was a man of great, original, and commanding genius, with a mind cultivated 

with the richest stores of intellectual wealth, and a ftmcy winged to the highest flights 

of a most captivating imagery ; of sound and spotless integrity, with a warm spirit 

but a generous heart ; and of courage and determination so characteristic as to hold 

30 



350 COWPER AND HIS CONTE MPOR AEIES . 

hiin forward as the strong example of what the old English heart could endure." 

Earl Greij. 

Kt, Hon. Henry Geattan, 1750-1820, was born in Dublin, and 
educated in Trinity College of tbat city. He attained the highest 
eminence as a speaker, both in the Irish Parliament and in the 
British. 

" He was the sole person in modern oratory of whom it could be said that he had 
attained the first class of eloquence in two Parliaments, differing from each other in 
their tastes, habits, and prejudices as much, probably, as any two assemblies of differ- 
ent nations." — Macldntosh. He is commended on all sides for the spotless purity of 
his life. His works are : Speeches in the Irish and in the Imperial Parliament, 4 vols ; 
Miscellaneous Works, etc. 

Adam Smith. 

Adam Smith, 1723-1790, was the ablest writer of his age 
on political economy, and one of the ablest of all ages. 
His work. The Wealth of Nations, is an acknowledged 
classic on that subject. 

Career. — Smith studied at Glasgow and Oxford, and became Lec- 
turer on Belles- Lettres at Edinburgh, and Professor of Moral Philoso- 
phy at Glasgow. From 1764 to 1766 he accompanied the Duke of 
Buccleugh, as tutor, on a tour over the continent. In this way he be- 
came acquainted with Turgot, Necker, D'Alembert, and the other lead- 
ing thinkers and writers of France of that day. From 1766 to 1776, 
while engaged in writing his Wealth of Nations, he lived in retire- 
ment. The last twelve years of his life he passed in Edinburgh, as 
Commissioner of Customs. 

His Atithorship. — Adam Smith belongs to that fortunate class of authors who 
have made themselves famous by one book. For although his Theory of Moral Senti- 
ments, published in 1759, was received with much favor and applause in the eighteenth 
century, it is not going too far to say that it has been rejected and almost ignored by 
the nineteenth. His lectures on Belles-Lettres. at Edinburgh, although they established 
Smith's reputation as a brilliant writer, were never published ; and his posthumous 
Essays on Philosophical Subjects are little known and read. Smith's fame, therefore, 
rests solely on his Wealth of Nations, which was published in 1776, but which had 
been contained, in substance, in one ol his courses of lectures at Glasgow. Still, this 
one work is enough to justify the fame of any man. To its author belongs the rare 
merit of having created a new department of study. Before Smith's work, it is true, 
other writers had thrown our hints and ideas on special topics, but Smith was the first 
to follow them out, to reduce the obscure and isolated gropings of would-be reforms 
to system and co-operation, to establish, generalize, and elucidate, — in short, to create 
the study of political economy. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITEES. 351 

A. New Science. — The publication of The Wealth of Nations marked a new era 
in human research. Thinkers saw that they were in the presence of a new and almost 
unexpected power, that what had before been regarded as a confused and arbitrary jum- 
bling of facts, was capable of being reduced to law and order, and that one of the great 
phases of social and political science must thenceforth be reconstructed from top to 
bottom. Some of the principles laid down by Smith have been abandoned, others have 
been modified or expanded, new principles have been added. But, as a whole, the 
science of political economy is as Smith left it, and his book is perhaps the most 
readable manual for the beginner. Part of its success is due to the grace and vigor of 
its style. 

"Perhaps the only book which produced an immediate, general, and irrevocable 
change in some of the most important parts of the legislation of all civilized states. 
The works of Grotius, of Locke, and of Montesquieu, which bear a resemblance to it in 
character, and had no inconsiderable analogy to it in the extent of tlieir popular in- 
fluence, were productive only of a general amendment, — not so conspicuous in par- 
ticular instances as discoverable, after a time, in the improved condition of human 
affairs. The work of Smith, as it touched upon those matters which may be num- 
bered and weighed, bore more visible and palpable fruit. In a few years it began to 
alter laws and treaties ; and has made its way through the convulsions of revolution 
and conquest to a due ascendant over the minds of men, with far less than the average 
of those obstructions of prejudice and clamor which ordinarily choke the channel 
through which truth flows into practice. The most eminent of those who have 
since cultivated and improved the science will be the foremost to address their im- 
mortal master." — Mackintosh. 

Priestley. 

Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804, was a distinguished chemist, 
.and also a writer of note on theological and political sub- 
jects. 

Career. — Priestley was educated for the Dissenting ministry, in which 
he served for many years, until his emigration to the United States, 
in 1794. He was for several years literary companion to the Earl 
of Shelburne, and also had charge of the largest Dissenting congre- 
gation in Birmingham. He made himself very unpopular by his 
Letters in Defence of the French Eevolution. Having given a din- 
ner-party to several friends, in commemoration of the destruction of 
the Bastile, the mob broke up the party and pillaged Priestley's house. 
Fortunately no one was injured. This was in 1791. Priestley removed 
from Birmingham to Hackney, where he became Principal of the Acad- 
emy. In 1794, he came to America, and settled himself in Northum- 
berland, Pennsylvania, where he gave himself up almost wholly to 
agricultural pursuits, preaching and lecturing occasionally. 

The Hatred against Him. — No really worthy man was probably ever made 
the object of more unceasing hatred than was Priestley. Had he lived in quieter 
times, he might have escaped with the name of a great but eccentric genius. But un- 
fortunately his age was that of the French Revolution. Tlie excesses of the Eevolu- 



352 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPOEARIES. 

tion and the hostilities between France and England had brought about a strong re- 
action against everything that savored of Jacobinism, The Tory party, led by Pitt 
and inspired by Burke, proceeded from one act of oppression to another. It was em- 
phatically the age of public prosecutions. Priestley, as a known sympathizer with 
revolutionary principles, both in religion and in politics, was peculiarly obnoxious. 
He was not prosecuted, it is true, but he was abused and anathematized with an 
energy that was so disproportionate to his amiable, peaceable character as to appear 
to us ridiculous. 

The absurdity becomes still more evident when we consider how comparatively un- 
important his theological and political writings are, and how exclusively his merits 
lay in another direction. Priestley was a Unitarian, a Socinian, a Materialist, perhaps, 
but no worse and no abler than many of his predecessors or contemporaries. Ilad he 
been nothing more than a writer on speculative philosophy, he would have fallen into 
obscurity long ago. But he was one of the greatest discoverers in the annals of 
British science, and, next to Lavoisier, was the founder of modern chemistry ; and he- 
should be judged as such, not as a mere writer. In private life he was amiable and 
upright. In public controversy he was apt to lose his judgment and his self- 
control. 

Works, — Priestley's works are extremely numerous. Of those on theology or philos- 
jophy the best known are the Institutes of Natural and Revealed Religion, giving a 
complete system of Socinianism, a Free Discussion of the Principles of Materialism and 
Free Necessity, History of Early Opinions concerning Christ, Letters to Burke, occa- 
sioned by his Reflections on the French Revolution, etc. As a man of science, Priest- 
ley is known as the discoverer of oxygen, sulphurous acid, muriatic acid, carbonic 
acid, and many other substances, and of the processes of respiration in animals and, 
in a measure at least, in plants. He laid the foundation for the chemistry of the 
gases, and invented new processes for the formation of artificial waters. Indeed he 
appears to have been one of those genial characters to whom nature is fond of whisper- 
ing her secrets. He did not think out so much as work out his discoveries. 

Horsley. 

Samuel Horsley, LL. D., 1733-1806, is known by his contro- 
versy with Priestley on the Unitarian question, and by a learned work 
on Isaiah. 

Horsley was born in London and educated at Cambridge. He became a Bishop in 
the Church of England, also a member of the Royal Society, and is well known for 
his attainments in mathematics and physics. In 1782-4, Horsley was engaged in a 
violent controversy with Dr. Priestley about the views which the latter had put forth 
concerning the belief of the primitive Christians as to the nature of Christ. In this 
encounter, Dr. Priestley, it is generally admitted, was worsted. In 1779 Horsley pub- 
lished an edition of Newton's complete works, which was pronounced by Playfair to 
be a complete failure. His literary reputation rests in the main on his critical dis- 
quisition upon the eighteenth chapter of Isaiah, and upon his collected Sermons. 

" Much original, deep, devout, and evangelical matter, with much that is bold, haz- 
ardous, speculative, and rash. . . . Bishop Horsley 's powers of mind were of a high 
order ; and his sermons and other works will render assistance to the student chiefly 
in the way of criticism." — Bickersteth. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 353 

RiCHAKD Price, D. D., 1723-1791, one of the most thoughtfal 
writers of the last century, was born in Wales, and educated at Cow- 
ard's Dissenting Academy, in London. He was a metaphysician of 
marked ability, a semi-Arian in his theological opinions, an ardent 
friend of liberty, and an advocate of republican institutions. 

In consequence of his liberal political opinions, he was invited by the Continental 
Congress to emigrate to America, but he declintd. In his metaphysical writings, he 
controverted the doctrine of a Moral Sense as irreconcilable with the unalterable 
character of moral ideas, and maintained that those ideas are eternal and original 
principles of the intellect itself, independent of the Divine Will. As a writer on 
political economy, he is chiefly known as the author of several pamphlets which 
suggested to Pitt the foundation of his great Funding Scheme for the National Debt. 

The following are the titles of some of his works: A Review of the Principal Ques- 
tions and Difficulties in Morals ; Dissertations on moral and religious subjects ; Obser- 
vations on Reversionary Payments, Annuities, etc.; An Appeal to the Public on the 
National Debt ; State of the Public Debts and Finances ; Observations on the Nature 
of Civil Liberty, Principles of Government, and the Justice and Policy of the War 
with America, etc. 

Paley, 

"William Paley, D. D., 1743-1805, attained great and per- 
manent celebrity by his writings on Moral Philosophy and 
kindred subjects. - 

Paley held a variety of church preferments, but is generally quoted 
as Archdeacon Paley. He was educated at Cambridge, and was Senior 
"Wrangler in his class. 

Paley's works are not so numerous as those of some divines of equal celebrity, but 
are of extraordinary excellence. They are Moral and Political Philosophy, Natural 
Theology, Evidences of Christianity, and Horse Paulinae. All these have been used as 
text-books in colleges and other institutions of learning, both in England and Amer- 
ica, to an extent not equalled by any other set of books on the same subjects, and 
part of them are still used extensively, notwithstanding the many and able treatises 
on these subjects which have appeared since the days of Paley. 

Paley's theory of morals, basing duty upon expediency, is regarded as unsound, and 
many of the practical duties which he deduced from it are considered lax. Yet such 
is the clearness of his reasoning, and so valuable is his work in the other portions of 
it, that many instructors even now prefer Paley's book on Moral Philosophy to any 
other, making in the classroom the corrections which may be needed. The latter 
part of his work, however, treating of Political Philosophy, is a meagre and unsatis- 
factory outline, and has never been much used. 

His Natural Theology, proving the existence and perfections of God from the evi- 
dences of design in his works, has never been superseded, and it probably never will 
be. The work on the Evidences, though excellent, has not been considered quite 
equal to his other works. The Horse Paulinaj, however, is unsurpassed as a specimen 
of ingenious reasoning from circumstantial evidence, and it will probably hold its own 
to the end of time. 

30* X 



354 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Dr. Paley wrote some other things, and published many sermons, but the four works 
named are all that are worth i-emembering. Of all who have written on these sub- 
jects, he stands unequalled for the clearness with which he expresses his ideas, and 
it is to Ids unrivalled power in this respect, rather than to any originality or depth as 
a thinker, that he owes his great and long-continued popularity. 

Reid. 

Thomas Reid, D. D., 1710-1796, was an eminent Scotch 
metaphysician. 

Eeid was born at Strachan, and educated at Marischal College. He 
was elected, in 1763, Professor of Moral Philosophy in King's College, 
Aberdeen, and then Professor in the University of Glasgow. The lat- 
ter position he held until his resignation, in 1781. 

His St/stem. — Dr. Reid founded a new school of metaphysics. Its object was to 
combat the errors of Hume and Berkeley and other advocates of the Ideal Theory. The 
corner-stone of his philosophy was his doctrine of Immediate Perception. Previous 
philosophers had said that the senses give us ideas, and the mind perceives these ideas. 
Reid contended that the mind perceives the objects themselves directly. Another 
prominent point in his system was his doctrine of Common Sense. Previous philoso- 
phers had maintained that all knowledge is built up from experience originating in 
sensation. Reid asserted that certain elementary truths or principles are perceived 
by the mind intuitively, without reference to sensation or to the external world; that 
these truths, both intellectual and moral, are perceived alike by all men, and show 
thereby the existence in all of a faculty which he calls the Common Sense. Reid's 
immediate disciple and the chief advocate of his philosophy was Dugald Stewart. The 
system, as a whole, has not held its ground. Rut some of his leading ideas, particu- 
larly those in regard to Immediate Perception and Common Sense or direct intuitions 
of intellectual and moral truths, are a part of the commonly received doctrines of the 
present day. 

Works. — Reid's chief works are An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Princi- 
ples of Common Sense; and Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man. Besides these, 
he published An Examination of Dr. Priestley's Opinion Concerning Matter and Mind; 
Physiological Reflections on Muscular Motion; Observations on the Utopia of Sir 
Thomas More, etc. 

James Balfour, 1708-1795, a jurist and a philosophical writer, and Professor of 
Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh, in 1754, was the author of Delinea- 
tions of Morality; Philosophical Essays; and Philosophical Dissertations. The last 
named were directed against Hume, but were written with so much candor that Hume 
wrote to the author a letter expressive of his esteem and requesting his friendship. 

Adam Ferguson. 

Adam Ferguson, LL D., 1724-1816, is favorably known both as a 
philosophical writer and an historian. 

Ferguson was a Scotchman, and a graduate of the University of St. Andrew's. He 
served for a time as chaplain in the army. He was chosen Professor of Natural Phi- 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 355 

losophy in the University of Edinliurgii in 1759, and Trofessor of Moral Philosophy in 
176JL A few years later, he travelled on the contiueut with the Earl of Chesterfield, 
and in 1778 he was Secretary to the Commissioners appointed to treat with the Amer- 
ican Congress. He resigned his professorship in 1785. The closing years of his life 
were spent in retirement at St. Andrew's. He died in his 93d year. His works are in 
high estimation: Institutes of Moral Philosophy; An Essay on the History of Civil 
Society; A Reply to Dr. Price on Civil and Religious Liberty; The History of the Ro- 
man Republic, 5 vols., 8vo. The work last named should be read as an introduction 
to Gibbon's Decline and Fall. Gibbon takes up tke story where Ferguson leaves off. 

Blair. 

Hugh Blair, D.D., 1718-1800, had a high reputation in his day as 
a writer of Sermons, and as the author of a course of Lectures on 
Ehetoric. 

Blair was one of the school of writers that prevailed in Edinburgh near the close 
of the last century, who were remarkable for correctness rather than for force and 
originality. His Sermons, the publication of which began in 1777, had a greater pop- 
ularity than any ever before known for works of that description. Dr. Johnson was 
unbounded in his admiration of them. "-Johnson: I love Blair's Sermons. Though 
the dog is a Scotchman, and a Presbyterian, and everything that he should not be, I 
was the first to praise him. Such was my candor (smiling). Mrs. Boscaicen: Such his 
great merit, to get the better of all your prejudices. Johnson: Why, madam, let us 
compound the matter: let us ascribe it to my candor and his merit." The Sermons 
circulated rapidly and widely, wherever the English language was spoken, and they 
were translated into almost all the languages of Europe. The King granted to him 
an annual pension of £200 for life. After a time, however, a reaction took place ; the 
Sermons began to be criticized as wanting in spiritual unction, and as artificial and 
stiff in composition. They wanted, it was said, that directness of purpose aud ex- 
pression, the earnestness and reality, which are essential to such writings. They have 
now fallen almost into oblivion ; and when mentioned at all, receive an estimate as 
much below, as the estimate of seventy years ago was above, their real worth. 

Besides the Sermons, Blair published Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles-Lettres. 
This work also was popular from the first, but its immediate popularity was not so 
great as that of the Sermons ; the Rhetoric, however, has survived the Sermons; it 
has been more used as a text-book on that subject, both in England and the United 
States, than any other book, and it is still widely used in both countries. 

Dr. Blair took an active part also in the controversy in regard to the Poems of 
Ossian. 

George Campbell, D. D., 1719-1796, Principal of Marischal Col- 
lege, was the author of a valuable work, The Philosophy of Ehetoric. 

Campbell wrote several other important works : A Dissertation on Miracles, in 
reply to Hume ; The Four Gospels, translated from the Greek, with Notes ; Lectures 
on Systematic Theology and Pulpit Eloquence; Lectures on Ecclesiastical History; 
Lectures on the Pastoral Character. His collected Works have been published in 6 
vols., 8vo. They are all valuable, but those on Miracles and on Rhetoric are the best, 
and are still in demand. 



356 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Alexander Gerard, D. D., 1728-1795, was a divine of the Scottish Church, a Pro- 
fessor of Philosophy lu Marischal College, and of Divinity in King's College, Aber- 
deen. His works are : Essay on Taste ; Essay on Genius ; Pastoral Care ; Evidences 
of Natural and Revealed Religion ; Sermons and Dissertations. 

James Burnet, Lord Monhoddo, 1714-1799, a learned Scotchman, 
wrote an elaborate work on The Origin and Progress of Language. 

Monboddo's work, which was in 6 vols., 8vo, displayed a vast amount of learning, 
hut subjected the author to ridicule, on account partly of his undue exaltation of the 
ancients, particularly of the Greeks, and partly because in it he advocated the supe- 
riority of the savage state over the civilized, and maintained the opinion that man 
was descended from the monkey. He published also another work, Ancient Meta- 
physics or the Science of TJniversals, 6 vols., 4to, evincing a like extravagant admira- 
tion for everything Grecian, and a scorn for all that was modern. 



Home Tooke. 

John Horne Tooke, 1736-1812, wrote a work, The Diversions of 
Purley, which has exerted an extensive and lasting influence on 
English philology. 

Career. — Tooke was the son of John Horne, a poulterer. He adopted the name 
of Tooke out of comi^liment to his benefactor, 'William Tooke of Purley. He was 
born at Westminster, and educated at Westminster, Eton, and Cambridge. He took 
orders in the church, but afterwards abandoned clerical life and studied law. He be- 
came a radical politician of the Wilkes's school, and having charged the King's troops 
with murdering the Americans at Le.xington, he was prosecuted by the Government 
for libel, and condemned to fine and imprisonment. He was subsequently, for other 
practices, arraigned for high treason, but was acquitted. The closing years of his life 
were spent in retirement. 

Works. — Tooke's political writings, which were numerous, were mostly in the 
form of pamphlets. Besides these, he published a work on philology, of great and 
lasting importance, not so much for what it contains, as for the new method which 
it inaugurated for treating such subjects. It was called The Diversions of Purley, 
and was published in 2 vols., 4to. In it he undertakes to give a critical analysis of 
language, and particularly of words as the elements of language, and to establish the 
principles of lexicography and of verbal criticism. Tooke's learning was not suffi- 
cient for such an undertaking. But he had great acuteness ; he made some most 
happy guesses as to the origin and force of particular words; and he effectually de- 
molished most of the traditional rubbish which had gathered around the subject. 
His work, though now in the main obsolete, did a great and timely service to English 
philology. 

William Tooke, 1744-1820, was a printer by trade originally, but studied and took 
orders in the Church of England, and became chaplain in Russia. He continued to 
reside in that country for a number of years, where he collected the materials for his 
subsequent historical and biographical works. His principal writings are : A Life of 
Catharine IT., A View of the Russian Empire under Catharine II., and A History 
of Russia from 862 to 1762. These works are more valuable for the information which 
they contain than for the graces of style, or for any evidences of a philosophic spirit. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 357 

Thomas Wakton, 1728-1790, is chiefly known by his Plistory of 
English Poetry. 

Warton was born at Basingstoke, and educated at Oxford, where he was successively 
Fellow, Professor of Poetry, and Professor of Ancient History. He was also Poet- 
Laureate from 1785 to 1790. He is mainly known by the work already named, A His- 
tory of English Poetrj^ 3 vols., 4to. The history is brought down only to the begin- 
ning of the eighteenth century. It is not very attractive in style, and not altogether 
accurate ; yet it contains much valuable matter not easily found elsewhere, and it did 
important service in calling attention to several neglected authors, whose works have 
since, in consequence of Warton's remarks, and still more in consequence of his quo- 
tations from them, been thoi-oughly explored. "VYarton's other works are : Observa- 
tions on the Faerie Queene of Spenser; numerous Poems and several Biographies. 

"Tom Warton was one of the finest fellows that ever breathed, and the gods had 
made him poetical, but not a poet." — Professor Wilson. 

Joseph Warton, 1722-1800, was brother of Thomas Warton the celebrated literary 
historian. Joseph Warton was educated at Oxford, and took orders in the Church of 
England. He published several poems, and translated the Eclogues and Georgics of 
Virgil. This translation appeared in conjunction with Pitt's translation of the ^neid 
in 1753. It is a very correct and smooth rendering, but does not equal Dryden's ver- 
sion in idiomatic strength. Warton also published an Essay on the Genius of 
Pope. His unfinished edition of Dryden's works was completed and published, after 
his death, by his son John Warton and others. 

Sir ^A/illiam Jones. 

Sir William Jones, 1746-1794, is the most distinguished 
name in the history of English philology. 

He was born in London ; studied at Harrow and Oxford ; was pri- 
vate tutor. in the family of Earl Spencer; was admitted to the bar in 
1774 ; and in 1783 was appointed Judge of the Supreme Court at Fort 
William (India). 

Other distinguished British philologists, such for instance as Bentley, Porson, and 
Wilson, have surpassed him in accuracy of research in special fields, but none have 
equalled him in breadth of vision. At a time when the science of language bad not yet 
been born, he was a proficient in many widely diflferent languages. But the service 
by which his name will ever be remembered is the presentation of the claims of the 
Sanscrit to the notice of European scholars. He was the first to announce the great 
fact that Sanscrit, Latin, and Greek are kindred tongues. This principle, after- 
wards developed so successfully by Bopp in his Comparative Grammar, hiis gained for 
Sir AVilliam Jones the title of Father of Comparative Philology. For, although the 
science has advanced wonderfully since then, and is now made to embrace all lan- 
guages and dialects, there is no doubt but that tiie recognition of the great Indo- 
European family was the germ from which the whole has sprung. 

Works. — Sir William Jones's principal works are his Grammar of the Persian Lan- 
guage, 1771; Dissertation sur la Litterature Orientale, same year; a Translation of 
Sakuntala, a Drama by Kalidasa, made in 1789, but not published until later; the first 



358 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

volume of Asiatic Researches, 17S9 ; a Translation of the Laws of Mami, 1794. Sir 
William Jones also established, 1784, the Asiatic Society, which has since contributed 
60 largely to the advancement of the study of oriental languages. A collected edition 
of his woi-ks was published in 1799, by Lord Teignmouth. In addition to his philo- 
logical attainments, Sir William Jones was profoundly versed iu the law, as is shown 
by his Essay on the Law of Bailments, published in 1781. 

Joseph Eitson, 1752-1803, did important service to literature bv 
his antiquarian researches. 

Ritson was Deputy High Bailiff of Lancaster. This lucrative sinecure gave him the 
means and the leisure for publishing a great number of works of antiquarian research. 
Unfortunately, his irritable temper kept him in constant feud with his contemporaries. 
The list of his works is almost interminable. The most prominent are : Observations 
on Warton's History of English Poetry; Criticism on Malone's Shakespeare; Robin 
Hood, a Collection of Poems. Ballads, etc., relating to that outlaw ; and Bibliographia 
Poetica, or catalogue of English poets of the 12th-16th centuries. Ritson's Essay ou 
Abstinence from Animal Food as a Moral Duty was attacked unmercifully in the 
Edinburgh Review by Brougham and Sydney Smith. 

" A man of acute observations, profound research, and great labor. These valuable 
attributes were unhappily combined with an eager irritability of temper which induced 
him to treat antiquarian trifles with the same seriousness which men of the world reserve 
for matters of importance, and disposed him to drive controversies into person*! quar- 
rels, by neglecting, in literary debates, the courtesies of ordinary society. It ought 
to be said, however, by one who knew him well, that this irritability of disposition was 
a constitutional and physical infirmitj', and that Ritson's extreme attachment to the 
severity of truth corresponded to the vigor of his criticisms upon the labors of others." 
— Sir Walter Scott. 

Bishop Percy. 

Thomas Percy, 1728-1811, gained for himself a permanent place 
in English literature by liis publication of The Eeliques of Ancient 
English Poetry. 

Percy studied at Oxford, took orders in the Church of England, and was finally 
made Bishop in the Irish Church. He published several books of a miscellaneous 
nature, but the work with which his name is indissoiubly connected is the one already 
named. The Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, published in 1765. This collection 
of old English ballads, it is not going too far to say, marked a new era in literature. 
It introduced a taste for the pure and healthy ballad of the folk, which had been lost 
during and since the age of the Restoration. The greatest minds in England and on 
the continent derived new delight and inspiration from the study of these Reliques 
of a half-forgotten age. We have only to turn to the biographies of men like Goethe, 
Bilrger, Schiller, Scott, Byron, and Wordsworth, to learn of their effect. Since Percy's 
day the good woi'k begun by him has gone on unceasingly. Other and larger stores 
of folk-song have been discovered, more accurate scholarship and sounder criticism 
have developed'themselves, but still the labors of Bishop Percy are not forgotten, 
and will not be so long as a genuine love of naive poetry remains. 

"A collection singularly heterogeneous, and A-ery unequal in merit, but from the 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 359 

publication of which, in 1765, some of high name have dated the reviral of a gennine 
feeling for true poetry in the public mind." — Hallam. " The first time I could scrape 
a few shillings together — which were not common occurrences with me — I bought 
unto myself a copy of these beloved volumes ; nor do I believe I ever read a book half 
so frequently or with half the enthusiasm." — Scott, in Lockhart's Life. 

William Hatley, 1745-1820, was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and, on leaving 
the University, retired to his estates in the country, and devoted himself to literary 
pursuits. He was the friend of Gibbon, the friend and biographer of Cowper, and -was in 
high repute at the close of the last century as one of the literary magnates of England, 
"by popular election, Iving of the English poets." — Southey. It seems diiEcult at 
this day to realize that Hayley could ever have enjoyed such a reputation, so utterly 
has he now disappeared from the public view. 

The following is a list of his principal publications: The Triumphs -of Temper, a 
Poem, in 6 cantos, 4to ; Poetical Epistle to an Eminent Painter, 4to; The Triumph of 
MiLsic, a Poem, 4to ; Essay on History, addressed to Gibbon, 4to ; Essay on Epic Poetry, 
4to ; Essay on Old Maids, 3 vols., 12mo ; Essay on Scul[)ture, 4to ; Life, Works, and Let- 
ters of Cowper, 3 vols., 4to ; Life of Milton, 4to., Life and Poetical Works of Milton, 
3 vols., folio, etc, 

\Vakefield. 

Gilbert Wakefield, 1756-1801, was a distinguislied clas- 
sical scholar and critic. 

Wakefield was born in Nottingham, and educated at Cambridge. 
He entered the ministry of the Church of England, but afterwards 
abandoned episcopacy and became very bitter towards it, ahhough he 
did not connect himself with any other religious body. He was clas- 
sical tutor in the Dissenting Academy at Warrington from 1779 to 
1783 ; taught a private school at Nottingham from 1784 to 1790 ; in 
1791-2 was classical tutor in the Dissenting Academy at Hackney. He 
wrote intemperately on ecclesiastical and political subjects, and in 1799 
was imprisoned for a year for a seditious libel. The sympathy for him, 
growing out of this appearance of persecution, led his political friends 
to make up for him a purse of £5000. 

Wakefield possessed accurate scholarship and acuteness of intellect, but lacked 
judgment ; he Avas violent in his prejudices, and bitter in his animosities ; and he re- 
belled ag.iiust authority, equally in church, in state, and in letters. His writings are 
valuable, not for his conclusions, but for the sharpness of his criticism. 

He published An Inquiry into the Expediency and Propriety of Social Worship, ad- 
vocating its inexpediency and impropriety ; An Inquiry concerning the Person of 
Jesus Christ; Evidences of Christianity; Examination of Paine's Age of Reason; 
Reply to Paine's Second Part of the Age of Reason; Translation of the New Testa- 
ment; Poetical Translations from the .\ncients; Memoirs of his Life, written by Him- 
self. He gave critical editions of Virgil, Horace, Lucretius, and several of the Greek 
Plays. 

"Gilbert Wakefield was a diligent, and, we believe, a sincere inquirer after truth, 



360 COWPEE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

but he was unhappily so framed in temper and habits of mind as to be nearly certain 
of missing it, in almost every topic of inquiry. He was as violent against the Greek 
accents as he was against the Triuiiy, and anathematized the final V as strongly as 
Episcopacy." — British Critic. 

"He had the pale complexion and the mild features of a saint, was a most gentle 
creature in domestic life, and a very amiable man ; but when he took part in political 
or religious controversy, his pen was dipped in gall." — Henry Crabb Robinson. 



Person. 

KicHARD PoRSON, 1759-1808, was the greatest Greek scholar of Lis 
day. 

Porson was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and was made Regius Professor of 
Greek in that University, but dissolved the connection on account of his scruples con- 
cerning the Thirty-Nine Articles. 

Porson's memory was remarkable, and his application, when not interfered with by 
intemperance, was extraordinary. He was conversant with the entire range of Greek 
and Latin classics, and extremely well read in English and French. He did not dis- 
play as much originality and breadth of view, perhaps, as his great predecessor, Bent- 
ley, but his power of verbal criticism was immense. In private intercourse, especially 
with the unlearned, he was amiable and unassuming; but he could not endure any 
affectation of learning, or unsound scholarship in any shape. Hence his literary con- 
troversies are unpleasantly bitter in tone. 

After leaving Cambridge he obtained the position of head librarian of the London 
Institution, and eked out his somewhat scanty salary by writing for the newspapers. 

Porson's published works do not correspond to his reputation. His life was too 
irregular, and too much harassed by petty cares, to permit him to give forth any one 
work fully commensurate with his genius. He edited several Greek plays, and pub- 
lished Notes and Emendations to the Greek poets, and numerous scattered essays. 
His celebrated Letters to Archdeacon Travis, against the authenticity of 1 John v 7, 
were bitter but able, and exhausted the argument oa that side of the question. 

Robert Potter. 1721-1804, a graduate of Cambridge and a clergyman of the Church 
of England, is favorably known as a translator from the Greek classics. His Trans- 
lations of the Plays of ^schylus, Euripides, and Sophocles have all been in demand, 
and all have substantial merit, though by no means of a high order. Potter also pub- 
lished a volume of Poems, and some other works of less note. 

Stuart and Revett. — James Stuart, 1713-1788, a classical scholar, and Nicholas 
Revett, 1720-1804, an accomplished architect and painter, connected themselves indis- 
solubly with the memorj^ of Grecian art and architecture, by their work. The Anti- 
quities of Athens Measured and Delineated, in 4 vols., imp. fob, first published in 
1762. In this great work, the first which gave exactness to our knowledge of Athenian 
antiquities, the literary portions were furnished by Stuart, and the drawings and 
measurements by Revett. It is popularly quoted as "Stuart and Revett's Athens." 

Jacob Bryant, 1715-1S04, was a man of great learning and a voluminous writer on 
learned topics. He was tutor to the sons of the Duke of Marlborough, and had free 
access to the famous library at the Duke's castle of Blenheim. His most important 
work -was one on the Ancient Mythology, 3 vols., Hq. Pe published Observations on 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WRITERS. 361 

Various Parts of Ancient History, in which he joined issue with the greatest critics, 
Eentie^', Grotius, Bochart, and Beza. He wrote also A Treatise on the Authenticity 
of the Scriptui-es and the Truth of the Christian Religion ; and many other works. 

Benjamin Blatnet, D.D., 1801, Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford, had a 

high reputation as a Biblical critic, and was employed for many years in revising for 
the Clarendon Press the text of the Authorized Version of the Bible, with a view 
chiefly of eliminating typographical errors. His edition has been followed since as 
the standard in England. He wrote also a New Translation of Jeremiah and Zecha- 
riah, with Notes, after the manner of Lowth's Version of Isaiah, but not with equal 
success. He published a learned Dissertation on Daniel's Seventy Weeks, and a criti- 
cal edition of the Samaritan Pentateuch. " Blayney was not deficient in harmony, 
but he had not that exquisite taste, and acute discernment of poetical beauty, for 
which Lowth was distinguished." — Orme. 

James Elphinston, 1721-1809, a Scotch schoolmaster, born in Edinburgh, exercised 
his vocation for a long time and with great favor, near London. Besides being intimate 
with Dr. Johnson and other literary celebrities, he dabbled a good deal in literature 
on his own account, and had a great fancy for reforming the sjjelling of the language. 
He made many attempts in this line, but found people just as obstinate on the subject 
then as they are now; no persuasions of the persevering Scotchman could make them 
see the beauty of writing prose, ov, boath, geniusses, /nglish, Latdn, etc. Reformers of 
this kind do not seem to see the enormous diificulty of getting a whole people to change 
a single word at any one"s bidding. Language, indeed, changes continually ; nothing 
is half so fluctuating. But the change is never made to order. Elphinstou published 
Propriety Ascertained in her Picture, an explanation of his phonographic system ; 
English Orthography Epitomized; Proprietie's Pocket Dictionary; Fifty Years' Cor- 
respondence between Geniusses of boath Sexes and James Elphinston, 8 vols.; Educa- 
tion, a Poem ; A Poetical Version of Racine's Redemption, etc., etc. 

Walker. 

John Walker, 1732-1807, a celebrated elocutionist of 
London, is 'widely known from liis connection with the 
English Dictionary. 

Walker was born at Colnev-Hatch, Middlesex, and was educated a 
Presbyterian, but became afterwards a zealous Catholic. He was in 
early life an actor. At the age of thirty-five he left the stage, and en- 
gaged in teaching, which after two years he abandoned and devoted 
himself to public lectures on Elocution. These he delivered with 
great applause in England, Scotland, and Ireland. 

Walker had a quick ear, and was a careful observer of the sounds of the language ; 
and bj- taking note of the way in which the several words were uttered by educated 
people, and by the best public speakers, he was enabled to give a standard for the 
pronunciation of English words. His Pronouncing Dictionary became an authority, 
not on the ground of his dictum, but because he had carefully and judiciously se- 
lected for each word or set of words that pronunciation which was used by genteel 
and educated people. It was an exact exhibit, prepared by an expert, of the actua} 
31 



3. ^WPER AND HIS CONTEMPOR AEIES . 

pronunciation of English words by good society. The work was so well done, that it 
helped greatly to fix what is in itself arbitrary and fluctuating, and Walker's pro- 
nunciation has continued accordingly without material change to the present day — 
almost a century from the time when he began his work. Walker was not a lexi- 
cographer. He was simply an orthoepist and elocutionist. All that he contributed 
to the Dictionary was to mark the pronunciation. His publications were : A Critical 
Pronouncing Dictionary of the English Language; A Key to the Pronunciatiou of the 
Greek and Latin Proper Names, and also to the Scripture Proper Names; A Rhyming 
Dictionary; Elements of Elocution; Elocution taught, like Music, by Tisible Signs; 
Rhetorical Grammar, etc. 

Lindley Murray. 

Lindley Murray, 1745-1826, holds about the same rela- 
tion to English Grammar that Walker holds to the English 
Dictionary. Murray's Grammar was, to many generations 
of school-boys and school-girls, the court in the last resort 
on all questions of correct speaking and writing. 

Murray, though an American by birth and education, is counted an 
English writer, as he became an Englishman by residence, and wrote 
all his works in England. He was born at Swatara, Lancaster County, 
Pennsylvania, and was educated in Philadelphia, at an academy of 
the Society of Friends, to which body he belonged. He began as 
a lawyer ; abandoned law for thei counting-house ; retired early with 
a competence ; and then lived for some years on the Hudson, three 
miles above New York. In 1784, being a little over forty, he re- 
moved to England, and remained there the remainder of his days, 
living at Holdgate, a mile from York. 

Murray was a devout Christian, and'he had the benevolence and the practical sense 
characteristic of the Society to which he belonged. The following are his principal 
works: The Power of Religion on the Mind in Retirement, Affliction, and at the Ap- 
proach of Death; The Duty and Benefit of a Daily Perusal of the Holy Scriptures: A 
Compendium of Religious Faith and Practice, designed for Young Persons of tlie 
Society of Friends ; and some other pieces, all of which w^e characterized by so- 
briety and good sense, and passed throuy,h manj" editions. But his main works were 
his English Grammar and his English Reader. These, though marked by no special 
originality or scholarship, yet by tlieir general correctness, and by their being pio- 
neers in the ground which they covered, acquired a ijrodigious influence which is 
not even yet spent. 

Murray was no philologist, and no scholar in the proper acceptation of the term; 
he was not even a grammarian, as the word is now understood. But he had a large 
fund of common sense, and he reduced to a practical form the grammatical princi- 
ples advanced first by Wallis and afterwards by Bishop Lowth. As En.iilish Gram- 
mar before that time had only begun to be a common study, scholars previously getting 
their knowledge of grammar from their study of Latin, Murray's book came in to 
supply a want just beginning to rise ; and it acquired, and for a long time held, ex- 
clusive possession of the field. His Grammar was in various foi-ms, from 2 vols., Svo, 



MISCELLANEOUS PKOSE WRITEES. 363 

down to small abridgments in ISmo, but the one chiefly in use was the 12mo, with 
which most readers are acquainted. 

Murray's English Reader, with the Introduction, and the Sequel, had an enormous 
sale, both in England and America. Indeed, they are still extensively used in both 
countries, and probably always will be used. A better selection has never been made 
for such a purpose, and the books deserved the popularity which they enjoyed. They 
cannot adequately represent English literature at this day, for many of the best 
things which exist in the language were not yet written when Murray's compilations 
were made. But up to the year 1800, these Readers contain the very marrow and 
fatness of what English literature had to give. 

Robert Henry, D. D., 1718-1790, a Scotch Presbyterian divine, educated at the Uni- 
versity of Oxford, is chiefly known as an author by his History of Great Britain, in 
6 vols., 4to, of which the last volume was edited by Laing after Henry's death. The 
history embraces the time from the invasion under Julius Caesar to the death of Henry 
VIII. It was continued by James Petit Andrews down to the accession of James I. 
Charles Knight has based his own excellent history upon Henry's plan slightly modi- 
fied. Henry's history embodies the labor of thirty years of anxious research ; the 
author has succeeded in making it a vast repository of information, but his style is 
dry, and his treatment too uuphilosophical to entitle him to a place by the side of 
Hume, Gibbon, and Hallam. 

William Russell, 1741-1793, a native of Scotland, removed in 1767 to London,where 
he was employed in various printing offices as corrector and literary manager. His 
leisure moments were passed in the composition of numerous miscellaneous works, 
chiefly of an historical nature. His poems and tales have fallen into neglect. He is 
known almost exclusively by his History of Modern Europe, down to 1618, in 5 vols., 
8vo. This work lays no claim to originality of investigation, but is a mere compila- 
tion. As such it still retains its value, although many of its statements and views 
should be corrected by the light of recent discoveries. 

TTiLLiAM Tytler, 1711-1792, a distinguished Scotch lawyer, father of Lord Wood- 
houselee, and grandfather of the author of the Histor3^ of Scotland, is chiefly known in 
the literary world by big famous Historical and Critical Inquiry into the Evidence 
against Mary Queen of Scots, one of the ablest arguments ever made in favor of the 
Queen. Mr. Tytler was also a man of general culture and an accomplished musician. 

WiLiiiAM GiLPiisr, 1724-1804, a clergyman of tlie Church of Eng- 
land, wrote many works, partly religious and partly descriptive and 
picturesque. Being an accomplished artist, he illustrated his works of 
the latter kind by drawings of his own, besides the etchings famished 
by his brother Sawery Gilpin, who was a professional artist. 

The following are Gilpin's principal works: Forest Scenery, 2 vols., 8vo ; Northern 
Tour, 2 vols. ; Southern Tour ; Western Tour ; Eastern Tour ; Scottish Tour, 2 vols. ; 
River Wye; Essaj'S on Picturesque Beautj', etc. ; Life of Bernard Gilpin ; of Latimer; 
of Wyckliffe ; of Cranmer ; Lives of the Reformers, 2 vols. ; Lectures on the Catechism 
of the Church of England ; Exposition of the New Testament, 2 vols. ; Sermons to a 
Country Congregation, 4 vols. ; 1 -^llogues on the Amusements of the Clergy. 

" Gilpin has described, in several justly esteemed Tours, the picturesque beauties 



364 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

of Great Britain. All his volumes are accompanied by engravings in aquatint, exe- 
cuted by himself with the taste and feelings of a painter. He has in some measure 
created a new kind of tour, which has found bad imitators everywhere. All his works 
abound with ingenious reflections, proper to enrich the theory of the arts and to guide 
the practice of them." — Biog. Universelle. 

Rev. Gilbert White, 1720-1793, was a native and a resident of Selborne, which he 
has made famous by his writings. He wrote a Natural History and Antiquities of Sel- 
borne, which has been published in a great variety of forms, and is considered a model 
of its kind. 

Arthur Young, 1741-1820, "left behind him a name, so far as the 
rural economy of Great Britain is concerned, inferior to that of no 
man in the kingdom." 

Young wrote exclusively on agricultural subjects, but in a popular way that made him 
entertaining for ordinary reading. The following are a few of his many publications : 
The Farmer's Letters to the People of England ; The Farmer's Letters to the Landlords 
of Great Britain ; A Six Week's Tour through the Southern Counties of England and 
Wales; A Six Month's Tour to the North of England, Rural Economy, etc., etc. 

" The works of Arthur Young did incomparably more than those of any other indi- 
vidual to introduce a taste for agriculture and to diffuse a knowledge of the art in this 
and other countries. They are written in an animated, forcible, pure English style, 
and are at once highly entertaining and instructive. Though sometimes rash and pre- 
judiced, his statements or inferences may in general be depended upon. His activity, 
perseverance, and devotedness to agriculture were unequalled. His Tours, especially 
those in Ireland and in France, which are both excellent, are most valuable publica- 
tions." — McCulloch: Lit. of Polit. Econ. 

Orme. 

BoBERT Orme, 1728-1801, acquired celebrity as historiographer to 
the British East India Company. 

Orme was the son of an English physician in the service of the East India Com- 
pany. He was educated at Harrow, and then returned to India and took a conspicu- 
ous part in the administration of the Company's affairs. It was by his influence that 
Clive was placed in military command, and thereby the foundation laid for British 
empire throughout the peninsula. 

Orme returned to England in 1758, and was appointed historiographer to the Com- 
pany. In this position he published a number of historical works, the most impor- 
tant of which are : History of the Military Transactions of the British in Hindostan, 
and Historical Fragments of the Mogul Empire, etc. These works are very minute 
in details, and carefully prepared ; but the narrative proceeds so slowly that the read- 
er's patience is wearied. It is to Orme that we owe the best account of Clive's appear- 
ance on the scene of action, the cruelties of Surajah Dowlah, and the unparalleled 
growth of the British power, that now seems like a di-eam. 

James Forbes, 1749-1819, a native of London, was employed for 
many years in India, in the civil service of the East India Company. 



MISCELLANEOUS PROSE WKITERS. 365 

On his return to England, Foi'bes published a work of great research and beauty, 
on the manners and customs "of the East : Oriental Memoirs, a Narrative of Seventeen 
Years' Residence in India, embellislied with ninety-five fine engravings, 4 vols., 4to. 
He published also Reflections on the Character of the Hindoos ; Letters from France, 
etc. Mr. Forbes compiled the work first named from his original materials of 150 
vols., folio. " The drawings and collections of Mr. Forbes seem almost to exceed the 
power of human industry and perseverance, and this literary monument to his name 
may fairly be considered the essence of his extraordinary researches." — London Lit. 
Gazette. 

George Foster, 1792, was a traveller and an employee in the civil service of 

the East India Company. He published A Journey from Bengal to England, 2 vols., 
4to ; Sketches of the Mythology and Customs of the Hindoos. 

JoxAS Hanwat, 1712-1786, was a native of Portsmouth. He lived some years in 
Russia, where he was engaged in mercantile business. On his return to England, he 
published a book of travels, called An Historical Account of the British Trade over 
the Caspian, etc., etc., 4 vols., 4to. A few years later, he published A Journal of Eight 
Days' Journey from Portsmouth to Kingston-upon-Thames, etc. Johnson says: "Jo- 
nas acquired some reputation by travelling abroad, but lost it all by travelling at 
home." 

George "Vancouver, 1750-1798, was one of England's great naval explorers. He 
served with Cook on the second and third voyage of the latter, and was ai)pointed to 
an independent command, for the purpose of exploration, in 1791. The fruit of his 
expedition was A Voyage of Discovery to the North Pacific and a Voyage Round the 
World, 3 vols., 4to. 

Thomas Pennant, 1726-1798, educated at Oxford, was an extensive traveller in his 
day, and published a great number of books of travel and treatises on subjects of nat- 
ural philosophy. His History of Quadrupeds and Arctic Zoology were highly com- 
mended by Cuvier. His Three Tours in Scotland and Tours in Wales abound in in- 
teresting details of topography and pleas mt bits of description. His Welsh travels 
contain some curious information about the bards of that country. 

Hon. Henry Cavendish, 1730-1810, an English gentleman of great wealth, and 
grandson of the Duke of Devonshire, lived a secluded life, devoting himself to the 
prosecution of chemical sciences. He made many valuable experiments and discov- 
eries, which were published in the Philosophical Transactions. 

John Abercrombie, 1726-1806, a Scotchman, wrote fourteen works on Horticulture, 
the most important of which was The Universal Gardener and Botanist. 

Thomas Bedboes, M. D., 1760-1808, noted chiefly as a chemist and physician, was a 
man of great versatility, and, in addition to his scientific publications, wrote several 
of a popular character, on education, politics, and political economy. Some of these 
are: History of Isaac Jenkins, a Moral Fiction; Observations on the Nature of De- 
monstrative Evidence; A Word in Defence of the Bill of Rights; An Essay on the 
Public Merits of ISIr. Pitt. Dr. Beddoes married a sister of Maria Edgeworth. 

John Moore, M. D., 1730-1802, a native of Stirling, Scotland, was educated at tho 
University of Glasgow. He s-tudied medicine in London and Paris, practised for some 
31* 



366 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

time in Glasgow, and aftei'wards spent much of his time on the continent. He was 
the father of the celebrated military hero, Sir John Moore. He was a man of letters, 
and wrote several works of merit: A View of Society and Manners in France, Swit- 
zerland, Germany, 2 vols., 8vo ; A View of Society and Manners in Italy, 2 vols., 8vo ; 
A View of the Causes and Progress of the French Revolution, 2 vols., 8vo ; Journal 
of a Residence in France, 2 vols., Svo ; Medical Sketches, 4to ; and Zelucco, Edward, 
and Mordaunt, Novels. 

William Hutton, 1723-1815, a bookseller of Birmingham, was the author of a num- 
ber of works, principally sketches of journeys in England. One of them, A Trip to 
Coatham, was written by Hutton in his eighty-sixth year. His works are interesting 
and valuable for the vast amount of topographical details that they contain. 

Beloe. 

Eev. William Beloe, 1756-1817, a pupil of Dr. Parr's, was for a 
long time connected with the literature and the literary men of Eng- 
land. 

Beloe was one of the librarians of the British Museum. His two best and best 
known Avorks are his Translation of Herodotus, and his Anecdotes of Literature and 
Scarce Books. Besides these, he published Translations of Aulus Gellius, Alciphron's 
Epistles, Rape of Helen, and Arabian Nights (from the French); Miscellanies, 3 vols.; 
Poems and Translations. He was one of the writers of the Biographical Dictionary, 
15 vols. He contributed to the Gentleman's Magazine, and was for many years editor 
of the British Critic. After his death appeared his autobiography, The Sexagenarian, 
or Memoirs of a Literary Life, containing amusing anecdotes, but censured for the free- 
dom of its remarks. " These volumes, for presumption, misstatement, and malignity, 
have rarely been exceeded, or even e(iualled." — Lowndes. 

Joseph Towers, LL.D., 1737-1799, born in Southwark, was a printer, then a book- 
seller, and finally a Unitarian preacher. He published British Biography, 10 vols., 
Svo ; Memoirs of Frederick the Great, 2 vols., Svo ; The Genuine Doctrines of Christi- 
anity ; Vindication of the Political Opinions of Locke ; Tracts on Political and Other 
Subjects, 3 vols., Svo. 

Robert Bisset, 1759-1805, a Scotch schoolmaster and author, is 
chiefly known by his History of the Reign of George III., which 
served as a continuation of the History of England by Hume and 
Smollett. 

Forty years ago, before the recent revolutions in historical writing, Hume, Smollett, 
and Bisset were printed together in consecutive volumes, as forming a connected 
history of England, and were, in the United States at least, the accepted and universal 
authority on that subject. Bisset's other works were Life of Edmund Burke ; Doug- 
las, a novel; Modern Litei-ature, a novel. 

Aaron Arrowsmith, 1750-1823, is extensively known by his geographical works. 
He was for a long time the principal authority on geographical matters, and was 
noted for the accuracy of the explanatory letter-press as well as for the clearness and 
beauty of his maps. Of the latter he published more than one hundred and thirty. 



MISCELLANEOUS PEOSE WRITERS. 367 

Alexander Adam, LL. D., 1741-1809, was Rector of the Edinburgh High-School. 
His Roman Antiquities and his Latin Grammar, though now superseded, were for a 
long time the leading text-books on those subjects in the United States as well as in 
Scotland. He was also the author of a work on Ancient Geography, and of a Sum- 
mary of Geography and History. 

William Enfield. LL. D., 1741-1797, a Unitarian minister, was 
an author of considerable celebrity. 

Enfield assisted Dr. Aikin in the General Biography, and wrote a large part of the 
Lives in the first volume of that work. He wrote The Preacher's Directory, contain- 
ing an arrangement of topics and texts; and published The English Preacher, a col- 
lection of short sermons from various authors, 9 vols., 12mo. He prepared several 
school-books which had not gone entirely into disuse when the writer of this para- 
graph was a boy : Enfield's Speaker, a collection of pieces in prose and verse ; Elocu- 
tion ; Natural Philosophy. He also published Sermons, Prayers, and a Selection of 
Hymns. But his chief work was a History of Philosophj-, 2 vols., 4to, being a trans- 
lation and abridgment of Buncker's Historia Critica Philosophia;, 6 vols., 4to. 

John Berkenhout, 1730-1791, was an English physician of Dutch origin, who, to 
numerous other avocations, gave considerable time to authorship. Besides several 
works of a scientific character, he published Biographia Literaria, a biographical his- 
tory of literature, containing the lives of authors, English, Scotch, and Irish. It was 
Intended to be in 3 vols., but only one volume appeared, running from the beginning 
of the fifth century to the end of the sixteenth. 

George Ellis, 1745-1815, did a good service to the cause of letters by his publication 
of Specimens of the Early English Poets, 3 vols., 1790 ; and his Specimens of Early 
English Romance in Metre, 3 vols., 1805. 

Gough the Antiquarian. 

EiCHARD Gough, 1735-1809, has been termed "The Camden of 
the 18th Century." He was indeed the prince of antiquarians of the 
age in which he lived. 

Gough was a native of London, and a graduate of Cambridge, and having an ample 
fortune he devoted his time and much of his money to the prosecution of antiquarian 
research. The following are his chief publications: Sepulchral Monuments in Great 
Britain, applied to illustrate the history of families, manners, habits, and arts, at differ- 
ent periods, from the Norman Conquest to the 17th century, 3 vols., fol., bound in 5 ; 
Anecdotes of British Topography, 2 vols., 4to ; Account of the Bedford Missal, 4to. 

"While the greater number of his associates might have been emulous of distin- 
guishing themselves in the gayeties of the table or the chase, it was the peculiar feel- 
ing and master-passion of young Gough's mind to be constantly looking upon every 
artificial object without as food for meditation and record. The mouldering turret 
and the crumbling arch, the moss-covered stone and the obliterated inscription, served 
to excite, in his mind, the most ardent sensations, and to kindle that fire of antiqua- 
rian research, which afterwards never knew decay ; which burnt with undiminished 
lustre at the close of his existence, and which prompted him, when in the full enjoy- 
ment of his bodily faculties, to explore long desolated castles and mansions, to tread 
long-neglected by-ways, and to snatch from impending oblivion many a precious relic. 



368 COWPER ANC HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

and many a venerable ancestry. He is the Camden of modern times. lie sjiared no 
labor, no toil, no expense, to obtain the best itilbrniation; and to give it publicity, 
■when obtained, in a manner the most liberal and effective." — Dlhdin. 

Francis Grose, 1731-1791, an antiquary of distinction, spent much time in travelling 
through Great Britain, sketching various objects and collecting materials for their 
history. The following are his principal works: Antiquities of England andTTales.^ 
vols., 4to; Antiquities of Scotland, 2 vols, 8vo; Antiquities of Ireland, 2 vols., 8vo ; 
Treatise on Ancient Armor, 4to ; Military Antiquity of the English Army, 2 vols., 4to ; 
Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue; A Provincial Glossary, etc., etc. He was 
also one of tlic conductors of the Antiquarian Repertorj-, 4 vols., 4to. 

Thomas Maurice, 1764-1821, a clergyman of the Church of England, and Assistant 
Librarian in the British Museum, published several historical and antiquarian works 
of great value : Indian Antiquities, 7 vols., 8vo ; History of Hiudostan, 2 vols., 4to ; 
Poems, Tragedies, etc. 

Samuel Pegge, LL.D., 1701-1796, a learned antiquary and a dignitary of the English 
Church, published several works that throw light upon the growth of English letters: 
Dissertations on some Elegant and very Yaluable Anglo-Saxon Remains; An Assem- 
blage of Coins fabricated by authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury ; Anony- 
miana, or Ten Centuries of Observations on Various Authors and Subjects; Curialia 
Miscellanea, or Anecdotes of Old Times; The Life of Robert Grosseteste, etc. — Samuel 
Pegge, Jr., 17S1-1800, was son of the preceding, and, like his father, an antiquarian. 
He was the author of the following works : Curialia, or an Historical Account of some 
Branches of tlie Royal Household ; Anecdotes of the English Language, chiefly re- 
garding the local dialect of London and its environs. 

Joseph Steutt, 1742-1802, was a well-known English engraver 
and antiquarian. 

Strutt's contributions to English archjeology are : The Legal and Ecclesiastical An- 
tiquities of England, Ilorda Angel-Cynnan (a Complete View of the Manners, Cus- 
toms, Arms, Habits, etc., of the People of England), two volumes of the Chronicles 
of England (down to the Norman Conquest), a Biographical Dictionary of Engravers, 
and Glig-Gamena Angel-Leod, or The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England. 
All these works are profusely and handsomely illustrated by Strutt himself. Be- 
sides these graver works, Strutt is the author of several tales and romances, one of 
■which, Queenhoo Hall, had the honor of being completed and published by Scott 
after the author's death. It is scarcely necessary to add that Strutt's works are of the 
greatest value to the lover of English antiquities. 

Samuel Atscough, 1745-lSOi, was for twenty years assistant librarian in the British 
Museum. lu connection with Mr. Harper and Dr. Maty, he prepared the Catalogue of 
printed books in the Museum, 2 vols., folio, 1787, each of the collaborators contrib- 
uting about one-third. He also prepared a Copious Index to the Remarkable Passages 
and Words in Stockdale's edition of Shakespeare, in 1784. He made indexes likewise 
to the Monthly Review, The British Critic, and the first 56 vols, of The Gentleman's 
Magazine. " His labors in literature were of the most useful cast, and manifested a 
patience and assiduity seldom to be met with; and his laborious exertions in the 
vast and invaluable library of the British Bluseum form a striking instance of his 
Zealand indefatigable attention." — Chalmers. 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 369 

Thomas Astle, 1734-1803, was a distinguished antiquary, and Keeper of the Records 
in theTower of London. By appointment of the House of Lor<ls, 1770, lie superintended 
the printing of tlie Ancient Records of Parliament, in 6 folio volumes. He was an 
active member of the Society of Antiquaries, and contributed numerous papers to the 
Archseologia. His greatest work is his Origin and Progress of Writing, 1781. " This 
Avork will fully establish Mr. Astle's literary fame, and will transmit his name with 
lustre to posterity." — Gentleman's Magazine. 

John Ferriae,, M. D., 1764-1815, was a man of literary taste and 
culture, and something of an antiquary. 

Ferriar was a resident of Manchester, and Physician to the Infirmary at that place. 
TVorks : The Prince of Angola, a Tragedy ; Medical Histories and Reflections, 3 vols., 
8vo ; Illustrations of Sterne, showing that Sterne pillaged largely from Burton, Hale, 
and the old French novelists ; Foxglove ; Biblomania, etc. " If we look closely into 
the style of composition which Sterne thought proper to adopt, we find a sure guide 
in the ingenious Dr. Ferriar, who. with the most scrupulous patience, has traced our 
author through the hidden sources whence he borrowed most of his striking and 
peculiar expressions." — Sir Walter Scott. 



IV. THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 

The Wesleys. 

John Wesley, 1703-1791, and Charles Wesley, 1708- 
1788, are distinguished as the founders of Methodism, the 
greatest religious movement since the Reformation. 

These great and good men were sons of the Eev. Samuel Wesley. 
They were born at Epworth, Lincolnshire, where their father was 
rector. Like the otlier members of the family, they were educated 
at Oxford ; both also entered the ministry of the Church of England. 
John was elected Fellow of Lincoln College, and was appointed Greek 
Lecturer. The two brothers, with fourteen others, members of the 
University, moved by a consideration of the low state of religion in 
the University, formed an association for the promotion of greater 
personal holiness, and received from the other students various nick- 
names, such as The Holy Club, The God Club, The Bible Bigots, 
The Methodists, etc. The term last named, thus given in derision, 
has adhered permanently to them and their followers. 

When General Oglethorpe went to America, in 1735, to found his 
new colony of Georgia, John and Charles AVesley accompanied him. 
They travelled a good deal through the colonies, preaching in different 
places, and returned to England, Charles in 1737, and John in 1738. 

In their suhsequent lahors in England and elsewhere, the work of organization and 
management fell upon John, whose talents for administration have rarely been 

Y 



370 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

equalled. Charles Avas a zealous and eflBcient preacher, but is especially noted as a 
hymnist. 

Wesley an, Hymnody . — A vein of poetry and music seems to have run through 
all the members of this remarkable family. The father, Samuel, wrote several vol- 
umes of poetry on religious subjects. Even John, in the midst of his overwhelming 
cares and labors, wrote many hymns, some of them excellent. Samuel, another 
brother, published a volume of poems. Samuel and Charles, in the next generation, 
sons of the hymnist, were famous as musical composers. But in Charles, the associate 
of John in the great work of founding Methodism, this kind of faculty was developed 
to an extraordinary degree, and he turned it to excellent account in the work in which 
they were both engaged. The Hymns of Charles Wesley were a great help to John 
in giving form and expression to the new religious movement. No man has written 
so many hymns as Charles "Wesley, and no one has written so many that have ob- 
tained general acceptance. As a literary monument, they are worthy to be placed 
beside the other great productions of genius. 

John Wesley lived to his eighty-eighth year, and continued his life of incessant 
ministerial labors to the last, — travelling, preaching, and writing. It is said that 
during his ministry of fifty-three years, he travelled 225i,000 miles, a great part of it 
on horseback, and preached more than 40,000 sermons. His printed works, as pub- 
lished immediately after his death, filled 32 vols., 8vo. A later edition, revised and 
condensed, is in 14 vols., 8vo. It is impossible, in a work like the present, to partic- 
ularize in regard to this great man. He wrote, as occasion required, on almost every 
topic growing out of the exigencies of a new religious community, — expository, hor- 
tatory, controversial, — and although no one work of his stands out as a special mon- 
ument of genius, few men have left ujjon the minds of their race so strong and abid- 
ing an impression of their own individuality. 

Some further details in regard to tlie Hymns of Charles and John Wesley are given 
in the Chapter on English Hymnody, 

Samuei. Wesley, Sen., 1664-1735, grandfather of John and Charles, 
was a clergyman of the English Church, rector of Epworth, Lin- 
colnshire. 

Wesley was educated at Oxford, and was a man of learning, poetically inclined, and 
the author of several works : The Life of our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, 
an Heroic Poem; The History of the Old and New Testament Attempted in Terse; 
Marlborough, or The Fate of Europe, a Poem ; Elegies on Queen Mary and Archbishop 
Tillotson; Maggots, or Poems on Several Subjects never before handled; Defence of a 
Letter concerning the Education of Dissenters ; Dissertations and Conjectures on the 
Book of Job, folio. "Poor Job! it Avas his eternal fate to be persecuted by his friends. 
His three comforters passed sentence of condemnation upon him, and he has been 
executing in effigy ever since. He was first bound to the stake by a long catena of 
Greek Fathers; then tortured by Pineda; then strangled by Caryl; and afterwards 
cut up by Wesley, and anatomized by Garnet.- Pi'ay don't reckon me amongst his 
hangmen." — Warhurton. 

Samuel Wesley, Jun., 1690-1739, son of the preceding, and father 
of John and Charles, was educated at Oxford, took orders in the church, 
and was for many years Head-Master of Tiverton School, Devonshire. 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 371 

Like most of the Wesleys, lie had a bent towards poetry. He published 
a quarto volume of Poems. 

■Whitefield. 

George Whitefield, 1714-1770, was the founder of the 
Calvinistic branch of the Methodists, and was the greatest 
preacher of his day, if not the greatest uninspired preacher 
of all time. 

Whitefield was born at Gloucester, and educated at Oxford. He was 
ordained in 1736; and embarked for Georgia in 1737; returned to 
England in 1738 ; and began preaching in the open air in 1739. 

The accounts given of the effects of Whitefield's eloquence border on the marvel- 
lous, and would be set down to credulity, were they not authenticated by so many and 
such unimpeachable witnesses. That these effects were in a great measure the fruits 
of mere oratory, — of voice, tone, and gesture, — is evident from the fact that his pub- 
lished sermons are decidedly commonplace, giving the reader uo idea of unusual power 
or eloquence. 

Whitefield's Works and Life have been published in 7 vols., 8vo. The contents con- 
sist of Letters, Journals, and Sermons. Whitefield preached extensively in America, 
and died here, at Newburyport, Mass. For over thirty years he was engaged with 
most extraordinary activity in public ministrations, chiefly itinerant. When his health 
began to fail, he put himself on what he called "short allowance," that is, preaching 
only once every week-day and three times on Sunday. In the course of his ministry, 
it is said, he crossed the Atlantic seven times, and preached 18,000 sermons. 

" There are extant seventy-five of the sermons by which Whitefield agitated nations, 
and the more remote influence of which is still distinctly to be traced in the popular 
divinity and the national character of Great Britain and of the United States. Defi- 
cient in learning, meagre in thought, and redundant in language as are these dis- 
courses, they yet fulfil the one great condition of genuine eloquence. They propa- 
gate their own kindly warmth, and leave their stings behind them." — Sir James Ste- 
phen in the Edinburgh Review. 

As an evidence of the persuasive power of Whitefield's eloquence, 
the following instance is related by Franklin. Whitefield had much 
at heart the establishment of an Orphan House in Savannah. 

" I did not disapprove of the design ; but, as Georgia was tlien destitute of materials 
and workmen, and it was proposed to send them from Philadelphia at a great expense, 
I thought it would have been better to have built the House at Philadelphia and 
brought the children to it. This I advised; but he was resolute in his first project, 
rejected my counsel, and I, therefore, refused to contribute. I happened soon after 
to attend one of his sermons, in the course of which I perceived he intended to finish 
with a collection, and I silently resolved he should get nothing from me I had in 
my pocket a handful of copper money, three or four silver dollars, and five pistoles in 
gold. As he proceeded, I began to soften, and concluded to give the copper. Another 
stroke of his oratory made me ashamed of that, and detorniined me to give the silver; 
and he finished so admirably that I emptied my pocket wholly into the collector's 



372 COWPER AND HIS COXTE MPOR A EI ES . 

dish, gold and all. At this sermon there was also one of our club, -who, being of my 
sentiments respecting the building in Georgia, aud, suspecting a collection might 
be intended, had, by precaution, emptied his pockets before he came from home. 
Towards the conclusion of the discourse, however, he felt a strong inclination to give, 
and applied to a neighbor, who stood near him, to lend him some money for the pur- 
pose. The request was fortunately made to perhaps the only man in the company 
who had the firmness not to be affected" by the preacher. His answer was, 'At any 
other time, friend Hopkiuson, I would lend to thee freely ; but not now, for thee seems 
to be out of thy right senses.' — Franklin'' s Autobiography. 

Toplady. 

Augustus M. Toplady, 1740-1778', born at Farnham, in Surrey, 
and educated at Westminster School, and in Trinity College, Dublin, 
was one of the ultra Calvinists of the English Church, and was noted 
for his assaults upon John Wesley on points of doctrine. 

Toplady's chief works on this subject are r The Doctrine of Absolute Predestination 
Stated and Asserted ; Historic Proof of the Doctrinal Calvinism of the Church of Eng- 
land; The Scheme of Christian and Philosophical Necessity Asserted, in opposition to 
Mr. John Weslej-, etc. Besides these controversial writings, Toplady was the author 
of a large number of Hymns, many of them of great excellence. Some of Topladj's 
Hymns are found in nearly every collection. The hymn, Eock of Ages, the best prob- 
ably in the language, will keep his memory fresh in the heart of the Christian Church 
long after all his sharp controversial essays are forgotten. 

William Huntington, S. S., 1744-1813, a popular Methodist preacher of London, was 
originally a laborer. He was the author of a number of sermons and controversial 
writings. The title S. S. is thus explained by Huntington himself: " As I cannot get 
a D. D. for the want of cash, neither can I get an M. A. for the want of learning ; 
therefore am I compelled to fly for refuge to S. S., by which I mean Sinner Saved." 

Thomas Coke, LL. D., 1747-1814, a Wesleyan missionary and writer, made nine voy- 
ages to the West Indies and the United States, as a missionary preacher. He wrote a 
general Commentary on the Old and New Testament, in 6 vols., 4to, and a Life of 

Wesley. 

Jones of Nayland. 

William Jones of Nayland, 1726-1800, was an Oxford scholar, 
of great eminence for erudition, and a voluminous writer. 

Jones's works have been printed in 12 vols., 8vo. The following are the principal : 
The Catholic Doctrine of the Trinity Proved ; Answer to Bishop Clayton's Essay on the 
Spirit; Natural Philosophy; Pliysiological Disquisitions; Lectures on the Figurative 
Language of the Scriptures ; The Scholar Armed against the Errors of the Times ; 
Life of Bishop Home, etc. Jones belonged to the Hutchinsonian school of theology. 
Besides his general erudition, he was specially skilled in music, and was a musical 
composer of no inconsiderable celebrity. 

Thomas Gibbons, D. D., 1720-1785, a Calvinistic Dissenting preacher in London, 
wrote a large number of works, chiefly theological. The Christian Minister, in 



THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 373 

three Poetical Epistles; Rhetoric, 8vo ; Memoirs of Eminently Pious Women, 2 vols., 
8vo; Memoirs of Dr. Watts; Sermons on Practical Subjects, 3 vols., 8vo. 

Robert Hawkes, 1753-1827, a Calvinistic divine, settled for fifty years at Plymouth, 
was the author of several religious works, mainly Commentaries. The following are 
the chief: Commentary on the Old Testament, 9 vols.; The Poor Man's Commentary 
on the Old Testament, 6 vols., 12mo ; The Poor Man's Commentary on the New Tes- 
tament. 4 vols., 12mo ; The Poor Man's Morning and Evening Portion, etc. 

McKnight. 

James McKnight, 1721-1800, is celebrated as a Commentator and 
as a Harmonist. 

He wa,3 a native of Argyleshire, Scotland, and was educated partly at the Univer- 
sity of Glasgow, and partly at Leyden. After preaching at Jedburgh and elsewhere, 
he was settled for the last twenty-eight years of his life at Edinburgh. 

McKnight is known chiefly by two works, each a monument of laborious diligence 
and scholarship. The first was A Harmony of the Four Gospels, in which the natu- 
ral order of eacli is preserved, with a paraphrase and notes, McKuight's Harmony is 
one of the standard works in the literature of the subject. His other great work, 
on which he spent, it is said, nearly thirty years, is A New Literal Translation from 
the Original Greek of All the Apostolical Epistles, with a Commentary and Notes, 
philological, critical, explanatory, and practical, 4 vols., 4to. McKnight on the Epis- 
tles is also one of the standard works which every theologian wishes to have in his 
library. Neither of these works is exhaustive or final. The science of hermeneutics 
has made great advances since McKuight's day. Yet they are works of great ability 
and of original research, and no interpreter even now can safely pass them by as super- 



Rev. Johx Williams, LL. D., 172&-179S, a learned dissenting minister, was for forty 
years settled over a congregation at Sydenham, Kent. He published A Concordance 
to the Greek Testament; Thoughts on Subscription to the Thirty-Nine Articles ; Free 
Inquiry into the Authenticity of the First and Second Chapters of St. Matthew ; On 
the Origin, and the Most Natural Method of Teaching the Languages ; The Tradition 
Concerning the Discovery of America by Prince Madog ab Owen Gwynedd. 

David Williams, 1738-1816, was born near Cardigan, in Wales. He was a Dissent- 
ing minister, and preached in various places. In 1773 he established an Academy at 
Chelsea. In 1776 he opened an independent chapel in London for public worship, to 
which all were invited " who acknowledged the being of a God and the utility of 
prayer and praise ; " in other words, a church for religious Deists. It maintained a 
feeble existence for about four years. In 1788-9 he founded the Royal Literary Fund. 

His chief publications were: Lectures on the Universal Principles and Duties of 
Religion and Morality, 2 vols., 4to; Apology for Preferring the Religion of Nature; 
Essays on Public Worship, Patriotism, and Projects for Reformation ; Sermons on Re- 
ligious Hypocrisy ; Nature and Extent of Intellectual Liberty ; Lectures on Political 
Principles ; Lectures on Education, 4 vols., 8vo ; Claims of Literature, giving an ac- 
count of the origin and objects of the Literary Fund, etc. 

Henry Hunter, D.D., 1741-1802, a native of Culross, Scotland, was pastor of the 
Scotch Church, London Wall. Hunter published, 1783-1802, seven volumes of Sacred 
32 



374 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Biography, which -u'ere at one time extreraelj^ popular ; also translated several works 
from the French, and published one or two volumes of Sermons, and one volume of 
Lectures on the Evidences of Christianity. 

JoHX Hey, D.D., 1734-1815, Avas a learned clergyman of the Church of England, and 
Professor of Divinity at Cambridge. He published An Essay on Redemption, a Sea- 
tonian puze poem ; Lectures on Divinity, 4 vols., 8vo ; Discourses on Malevolent Sen- 
timents; General Observations on the Writings of Paul. — Richard Hey, LL. D., bar- 
rister-at-law, a brother of the preceding, was likewise- a man of great learning. He 
■wrote The Captive Monarch, a Tragedy ; Edrington, a Novel; Civil Liberty and the 
Principles of Government ; Dissertations on Gaming, Duelling, and Suicide ; Happi- 
ness and Rights, in answer to Tom Paine. 

Horne. 

George Horne, D. D., 1730-1792, an eminent divine of the Church 
of England, belonging to what is known as the Hutchinsonian school 
of theology, published a valuable Commentary on the Psalms. 

Horne was Vice-Chaucellor of the University of Oxford, Dean of Canterbury, and 
Bishop of Norwich. Besides several controversial works, in favor of Hutchinson and 
against Sir Isaac Newton, Adam Smith, Law, Kennicott, Priestley, and others, he wrote 
Letters on Infiilelity, in reply to Hume, and A Commentary on the Psalms. The work 
last named is his best, and is in high favor, even to this day. 

"His Commentary on the Psalms is his capital performance, and the one by which 
he will be known so long .as piety and elegant learning are loved in England. It is 
altogether a beautiful w"ork. The preface is a masterpiece of composition and good 
sense. The exposition implies more learning and research than it displays ; and the 
views of Christian doctrine contained in it are generally very correct. Perhaps he 
carries his applications to the Messiah and his Church occasionally rather far ; but 
this is less hurtful than the opposite extreme, which has more generally been adopted." 
— Orme's Bihl. Bib. 

Joseph Milner, 1744-1797, a learned scholar and divine of the 
English Church, besides several works of less importance, published A 
History of the Church of Christ, in 5 vols., 8vo, which has been often 
printed, and which has led to much discussion. 

" If Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History has been, a little too epigrammatically, styled 
the History of Sinners, that of the late Dr. Milner has been as concisely called the His- 
tory of Saints. But the latter is a learned and valuable work, dashed though it may 
be with some little spice of Calvinism." — Dihdin. 

" Of the two most popular compilers of church history, Mosheim gives the mere 
husk of history; Milner, nothing but some separated particles of pure farina." — Isaac 
Taylor. 

William Newcome, D. D., 1729-1800, Archbishop of Armagh, in 
Ireland, is well known by his Harmony of the Gospels, and by his 
various writings on the subject of a new revision of the English version 
of the Scriptures. 



THEOLOGICAL WEITERS. 375 

Besides the Harmony, he published the following works : An Attempt towards an 
Improved Version, a Metrical Arrangement, and an Explanation of the Prophet Daniel 
and of the Twelve Minor Prophets; An Historical View of the English Biblical Trans- 
lations; An Attempt towards Revising an English Translation of the Greek Scrip- 
tures ; The Chief Difficulties in the Gospel History respecting Our Lord's Resurrection ; 
The Duration of Our Lord's Ministry ; Observations on Our Lord's Conduct as a Divine 
Instructor, etc. 

Newcome's Gospel Harmony was a most valuable contribution to the literature of 
this subject. His labors towards a revision of the translation of Scripture have also 
been very useful in keeping the attention of scholars awake to this important subject. 

John Parkhurst, 1728-1797, is chiefly known by his Hebrew and English Lexicon, 
and his Greek and English Lexicon to the New Testament. Both are faulty and are 
now superseded, but they had a great run in their day. Besides his Lexicons, Park- 
hurst wrote A Serious and Friendly Admonition to John Wesley, in opposition to the 
doctrine of assurance ; and Tlie Divinity and Pre-Existence of Our Lord and Saviour 
Jesus Christ, in reply to Priestley. Parkhurst was of the Hutchinsonian school of 
philosophy. 

Beilby Portetjs, D.D., 1731-1808, a dignitary of the English Church, for a long time 
Bishop of London, is held in great respect by Christians of every name. A collective 
edition of his works has been published, in 6 vols., 8vo. The best known of his 
■writings are the following: Lectures on Matthew ; Sermons on Several Subjects ; Life 
and Character of Archbishop Seeker ; Charges, Tracts, etc. ; Summary of the Evidences 
of Christianity. Bishop Porteus's Lectures on Matthew, and his Sermons, were popu- 
lar fiir beyond what is usual in such publications, and each of them has gone through 
twenty or more editions. 

Bishop Hurd. 

EiCHARD HuRD, D. D., 1720-1808, a learned Bisliop of the English 
Church, is favorably known by his various works as a classical and 
biblical critic and commentator. 

Hurd was a native of Staffordshire, and was educated at Cambridge. His principal 
works are : Commentaries on Horace's Ars Poetica and the Epistola ad Augustum, Dia- 
logues on various abstract and political subjects. An Introduction to the Study of the 
Prophecies concerning the Christian Church, a collection of Sermons, and a Life of 
Warburton. 

" Hurd has perhaps the merit of being the first who in this country aimed at philo- 
sophical criticism; he had great ingenuity, a good deal of reading, and a facility in 
applying it ; but he did not feel very deeply, was somewhat of a coxcomb, and having 
always before his eyes a model (Warburton) neither good in itself nor made for 
him to emulate, he assumes a dogmatic arrogance, which, as it always offends the 
re-.ider, so for the most part stands in the way of the author's own search for truth." 
— Hallam. 

William Romaine, 1714-1795, a divine of the Church of England, educated at Ox- 
ford, came first into notice by an attack upon Warburton's Divine Legation of Moses, 
which involved him in a controversy with that pugnacious prelate. He was a zealous 
and fearless pi-eacher, and held several important offices in the Church. His chief 
works are the following: The Life of Faith; The Walk of Faith; The Triumph of 



376 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Faith; The Scriptural Doctrine of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper; Essay on 
Psalmody ; Discourse on the Law and the Gospel ; The Lord our Righteousness, etc. 

EiCHARD Watson, D. D., 1737-1816, a learned Bishop and theolo- 
gian of the Church of England, is known chiefly by An Apology for 
Christianity, in reply to Gibbon, and An Apology for the Bible, in 
reply to Paine. 

Watson was born at Haversham, and educated at Cambridge. He was Professor of 
Chemistry there, and afterwards Regius Professor of Divinity. Besides several works 
on Chemistry, and the two works which have already been named, he published a 
collection of Theological Tracts, 6 vols., 8vo, selected from various authors, and in- 
tended for the use of theological students. Watson's Theological Tracts have an ex- 
cellent name, and have had an extensive circulation. 

John Fleetwood, an English theological writer, published The Christian Dictionary, 
and The Life of Christ. The latter has had a large sale. 

Rev. Richard Cecil, 1748-1810, a clergyman of the English Church, was celebrated 
as an evangelical preacher. Works: Life of Rev. John Newton; Life of Rev. W. B. 
Cadogan ; and Life of John Bacon ; Sermons; Remains. 

Rev. Charles Buck, 1771-1815, is known by two works which have had a very large 
sale, both in England and America : Religious Anecdotes ; and Theological Dictionary. 

Eev. AisTDREW Fuller, 1754-1815, was a Baptist divine of great 
eminence. His writings are chiefly in defence of the Calvinistic sys- 
tem of theology. 

The following are his principal works : The Calvinistic and Socinian Systems ex- 
amined and compared ; Socinianism Indefensible ; The Gospel its Own Witness ; The 
Backslider ; Discourses on the Apocalypse ; The Harmony of Scripture ; Expository 
Discourses on Genesis ; Dialogues, Letters, and Essays on Tarious Subjects, etc. His 
complete works, 3 vols., 8vo, have been issued by the American Baptist Publication 
Society. 

Alexander Geddes, 1737-1802, was a Catholic divine, with a 
high reputation for learning and diligence. 

Geddes undertook to give a new translation of the Scriptures, with critical notes ; 
but his commentary was so tinctured with infidel glosses that he was suspended from 
the priesthood, and the work was discontinued. 

Eev. Joseph Berington, 1743-1827, was a Catholic clergyman, 

and a writer of some note. 

His chief publications were : A Letter on Materialism, in reply to Hartley; Imma- 
terialism Delineated; The State and Behavior of English Catholics, from the Reforma- 
tion till 1780; Address to the Protestant Dissenters ; An Exposition of Roman Cath- 
olic Principles, with reference to God and the Country; On the Depravity of the 
Nation, with a View to the Promotion of Sunday-Schools ; The Rights of Dissenters 
from the Established Church ; History of the Lives of Abelard and Heloisa; History 
of the Reigns of Henry II. and of Richard and John; The Literary History of the 
Middle Ages. The work last named is the one best known and of most general interest. 




CHAPTER XIV. 

Sir Walter Scott and His Contemporaries. 

The chief public events during the first quarter of the 
present century were the Napoleonic wars, and the political 
settlements which followed the downfall of Napoleon and 
the restoration of the Bourbons to the throne of France. 
No English writer during this period filled so large a. space 
in the public mind as Sir Walter Scott. 

The writers of this period may be divided into six sec- 
tions : 1. The Poets, beginning with Byron ; 2. The Novel- 
ists, beginning with Scott ; 3. The Reviewers and Political 
Writers, beginning with Gifibrd; 4. Philosophical and Sci- 
entific Writers, beginning with Dugald Stewart; 5. Reli- 
gious and Theological Writers, beginning with Scott the 
Commentator ; 6. Miscellaneous Writers, beginning with 
Mrs. Barbauld. 

I. THE POETS. 

Byron. 

George Gordon, Lord Byron, 1788-1824, was, on the 
whole, the greatest English poet of his day, although he had 
many illustrious competitors. His poems are indeed very 
unequal, and abound in passages open to criticism. At the 
same time, it should be remembered that the amount which 
he wrote was large. If he often falls below the stand- 
ard, and much that he has written could well be spared, a 
32* 377 



378 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORAEIES. 

large amount still remains that is of a very high order of 
poetry, and there are passages in his works that are unsur- 
passed by anything in the language, except in the writings 
of Shakespeare. 

Career. — Probably no English poet that has ever lived was so much 
read, quoted, and canvassed, during his lifetime, as Lord Byron. 
Everything in liis social position, in his personal history and character, 
and in the character of his writings, seemed to contribute to this result. 
He was of noble family, though his estate had been impoverished by 
spendthrift and prodigal ancestors. In person, though not faultless, he 
had yet such attractions of form and features and voice as amounted 
almost to a fascination. His talents, if not of the very highest order, 
were yet wonderful, and were precisely of the kind that dazzle and 
bewilder. 

Byron's first attempt at authorship led to an issue at arms with the 
highest critical authority then known, the Edinburgh Review, and by 
the very fierceness of the attack and reply brought his name imme- 
diately to every one's mouth. His marriage only led to an open 
scandal, the mystery of which is not even yet solved ; and by the high 
social position of the parties caused every utterance of the poet to be 
watched and analyzed. In addition to these things, the peculiar and 
irregular style of his lordship's writings, as well as of his life, caused 
everything to be in request that came from his pen. 

First Publication. — Byron's first publication, issued at the age of 
nineteen, was Hours of Idleness. It contained little worthy of notice, 
and it might have passed quietly into oblivion but for the ferocious 
criticism upon it by the Edinburgh Review, then at the height of 
its power. Byron was furious, and under the impulse of his first 
burst of passion, he wrote, almost at white heat, English Bards and 
Scotch Reviewers, in which he slashed away, right and left, with great 
injustice, but Avith a degree of daring and vigor that gained for him at 
once the public ear and sympathy. He afterwards condemned his 
youthful poems as heartily as the Reviewer had done, and suppressed 
them in England and wherever he could control the matter. He also 
acknowledged the injustice of his invective. But the affair gave him 
instant notoriety. It awakened him also to a consciousness of his 
powers. 

Subsequent Career. —Soon after this affair, Byron travelled on the 
continent, and gave the result of his observations in the first portion 
of his next and greatest poem, Childe Harold. If the first publication 
made him notorious, this made him famous. 



THE POETS. 379 

Returning home, he entered Parliament, and took some part in pub- 
lic affairs. He was also married to Miss Millbanke, a lady of fortune ; 
but after living together for a few months, they separated, for reasons 
admitted to be not creditable to him, though never clearly divulged. 
Lord Byron after this left England never to return. His remaming 
days were spent in Switzerland, Italy, and Greece, and he died in the 
noble effort to aid the Greeks in their struggle for independence. 

Other Worlis. — Byron's other works, produced mostly during the irregular life 
that he led on the continent, were The Two Foscari, a Tragedy ; Werner, a Tragedy ; 
Sardanapalus, a Tragedy; The Deformed Transformed; Cain, a Mystery; Heaven and 
Earth, a Mystery; The Vision of Judgment ; Don Juan; The Prisoner of Chillon; The 
Bride of Abydos ; The Dream ; Mazeppa ; Marino Faliero ; Manfred; The Giaour ; The 
Corsair: The Siege of Corinth; Lara; Parisina, etc. The Memoirs of him by Moore 
must also be considered in giving an account of Byron's works, as these Memoirs are 
made up to a great extent of his own Letters. 

Esthnate of Him. — That Byron had genius of a high order, can hardly be called 
in question. But the mere possession of genius, or even an irregular and fitful exer- 
cise of it, does not insure greatness, either in art or in aifairs. For the production of 
any great work of art, there must be, in connection with genius, long-continued, per- 
sistent labor and method, such as that which Milton gave to his Paradise Lost, such as 
that which Tennyson has given to his Arthurian Legends, such as, according to the best 
evidence we now have, Shakespeare himself gave to the composition and perfecting 
of his Dramas. Byron's works abound in passages of extraordinary beauty and sub- 
limity ; but they abound also in blemishes and marks of haste and feebleness ; no one 
of his poems, taken as a whole, can be accepted as a finished and satisfying work 
of art. 

CJiarncter as a Man. — Byron has so identified himself with his works that the 
two must be estimated together : and the settled judgment of the Avorld is that he was 
a bad man. He had many shining and some noble qualities; but he was a selfish 
libertine, both in his life and opinions, and he deserves the neglect towards which he 
is slowly but surely gravitating. 

Moore. 

Thomas Moore, 1779-1852, survived most of the -writers 
who w^ere his contemporaries, but his chief works were writ- 
ten in the early part of this century. Although he lived 
till 1852, he is associated in history with Byron, Slielley, 
Southey, and the men of their time. 

Career.— Moore was a native of Ireland, and studied at Trinity 
College, Dublin. He held at one time a Government position in Ber- 
muda, made one journey through tlie United States, and visited the 
continent twice. The greater part of his life, however, was passed in 
England. 



380 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Moore's talent as a versifier and poet was very precocious. When only fourteen, he 
published in the Anthologia Hibernica, some verses which are not without merit, and 
which show plainly the future drift of his genius. His first really important publi- 
cation was his Translations of Anacreon, in 1800. These have been both warmly ad- 
mired and severely criticized. As specimens of English erotic verse they are un- 
doubtedly among the best in the language, but are far from satisfying the modern 
canons of translation. They are not literal. 

The Anacreon was followed by The Poetical Works of the late " Thomas Little," a 
pseudonym employed by Moore for a time to cover a collection of poems even more 
Anacreontic than Anacreon himself. 

In 1806 appeared his Epistles, Odes, etc., which were no less licentious. A bitter 
review by Jeffrey, in the Edinburgh Review, caused a challenge to pass between him 
and the reviewer, but the duel was prevented by the arrest of both parties. The two 
subsequently became firm friends. 

In 1812 there appeared the Intercepted Letters, or the Two-Penny Post-Bag. This 
was a collection of satires against the prince-regent and the Government, and met 
with immense success. 

In 1813 Moore published the first instalment of his Irish Melodies, although the 
work was not completed until 1834. Lalla Rookh appeared in 1817, the Fudge Family 
in Paris (an imitation of the Two-Penny Post-Bag) in 1818, Loves of the Angels in 
1823. These are Moore's principal poetical works. In prose he produced, among 
other things, the Life of Byron and the Life of Sheridan. 

Character as a Poet, — Few poets have been more successful than Moore, and 
this success is due, in part, to the consistency with which he devoted himself to 
one style of poetry. He never suffered himself to be tempted by ambition into 
writing on grand themes, for which he felt himself unfitted. His verses are the 
smoothest and softest in the language, and never rise above the level of average 
sentiment. Even his Irish Melodies, which profess to give the spirit of the Irish 
people, are anything but true folk-songs. They have not the intensity and abrupt- 
ness of passion characteristic of that kind of verse. Moore is always graceful in 
his imagery, but never sublime ; emotional, but not impassioned. The licentiousness 
which disfigured his earlier works disappeared in the later ones. Still, even at his 
best, Moore is not a grand lyric poet. He is merely a singer of sweet verse. 

Shelley. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley, 1792-1822, was a poet of great 
and original genius, whose career was in many respects like 
that of Byron, with whom indeed he was intimately asso- 
ciated. 

Career. — Sliellev was a descendant of one of the oldest English 
families. He appears to have disj^lajed his poetic genius at an early 
age. In his sixteenth year, and before he had gone to college, he 
published two unsuccessful poems, Zastrozzi and St. Irvyne, and also 
assisted Medwin in his Ahasuerus, While at Oxford he got printed, 
in London, a pamphlet headed A Defence of Atheism. It was in- 
tended, as Shelley afterwards asserted, merely as a sort of dialectic 



THE POETS. 381 

challenge, probably after the fashion of the scholastics of the Middle 
Ages. Had Shelley been content with merely publishing the pam- 
phlet, the matter would have been ignored. But, in his youthful en- 
thusiasm, he pressed himself so conspicuously and so persistently upon 
the attention of the University authorities, that they were forced to 
expel him publicly, as an atheist. 

A few months afterwards he made a runaway match with the daugh- 
ter of a retired hotel-keeper. There does not appear to have been 
much love on Shelley's part. Before the end of three years they were 
separated. Two years after the separation (1816) Mrs. Shelley com- 
mitted suicide by drowning. The children by the marriage were re- 
tained by her father. Shelley applied to the Chancellor, Lord Eldon, 
for an order giving him the custody. This the Chancellor refused, on 
the ground that Shelley was an improper person to have the guardian- 
ship. 

Soon after the death of his first wife, Shelley married Mary Woll- 
stonecraft Godwin, with whom he had been travelling on the conti- 
nent. In 1818 he left England never to see it again. The remaining 
four years of his life were passed in Italy, during a part of which time 
he was very intimate with Byron. On June 30, 1822, he was drowned 
by the upsetting of a boat in a sudden squall in the Bay of Spezzia. 
His body was washed ashore, and, in accordance with the Tuscan 
quarantine law then prevailing, was burned by the authorities. The 
ashes were deposited in Kome. 

Foetical Character. — Shelley is, of all English poets, pre-eminently the poet of 
imagination and sensibility. His life must be pronoiinced, in one sense, a failure. His 
physical organization was so delicate, his moral and poetical sensibilities were so acute, 
as to unfit him for the full exercise of his really great powers. It is generally conceded, 
at the present day, that had Shelley lived to outgrow his weakness, and to cure his 
vagaries by the slow but certain lessons of experience, he would have produced some 
masterpiece. This view is based upon the fact that his later productions show such a 
mai-ked improvement upon his earlier pieces. Like Keats, Avith whom he has more 
than one trait in common, he grew better and better with age. 

Worhs. — His earliest work of note, Queen Mab, published in 1813, is little more 
than a treatise in defence of Atheism, full of conceits, and offering occasionally fine 
passages. Alastor, published only three years later, in 1816, shows already an im- 
mense improvement. The Cenci, 1819, although revolting from its subject, is still 
better as a poem, while the Prometheus Unbound. 1821, and the Adonais, or Elegy on 
Keats, are the best of his larger poems. Manj' of his minor poems appeared posthu- 
mously. Conspicuously among them are The Cloud, and The Sensitive Plant, so famil- 
iar to lovers of Ij'ric poetry. 

Shelley's views on religion and society seem to have been due to an innate spirit of 
boyish opposition, united with a feeling of contempt for the empty conventionality 
that reigned in England fifty years ago. His mind was already engaged iu the process 



382 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPOR AEIES. 

of self-purification when arrested by death. Imperfect as he remained, he has not been 
excelled by any English poet in the subtlety and bnruing force of his imagination 
and in exquisitely chosen diction. 

"The strong imagination of Shelley made him an idolater in his own despite. Out 
of the most indefinite terms of a hard, cold, dark, metaphysical system, he maile a 
gorgeous Pantheon, full of beautiful, majestic, life-like forms. He turned Atheism 
itself into a mythology, rich with visions as glorious as the gods that live in the 
marble of Phidias, or the Virgin saints that smile on us from the canvas of Murillo. 
The Spirit of Beauty, the Principle of Good, the Principle of Evil, when he treated of 
them, ceased to be abstractions. They took shape and color. They were no longer 
mere words, but 'intelligible forms,' 'fair humanities, objects of love, of adoration, or 
of fear.' As there can be no stronger sign of a mind destitute of the poetical faculty 
than that tendency which was so common among the writers of the French school, to 
turn images into abstractions, — Venus, for example, into Love, Minerva into Wisdom, 
Mars into War, and Bacchus into festivity, — so there can be no stronger sign of a 
mind truly poetical than a disposition to reverse this abstracting process, and to make 
individuals out of generalities. Some of the metaphysical and ethical theories of 
Shelley were certainly most absui'd and pernicious. But we doubt whether any 
modern poet has possessed in an equal degree the highest qualities of the great ancient 
masters. The words bard and inspiration, which seem so cold and aifected when ap- 
plied to other modern writers, have a perfect propriety when applied to him. He was 
not an author, but a bard. His poetry seems not to have been an art but an Inspira- 
tion. Had he lived to the full age of man, he might not improbably have given to the 
world some great work of the very highest rank in design and execution." — Macaulay. 

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, 1798-1851, daughter of the well- 
known William Godwin, and second wife of Shelley, was herself a 
writer of considerable abilities. 

Mrs. Shelley is chiefly known to the literary world by her edition of her husband's 
■works, to which she has prefixed a good biographical sketch, and also by her novels, 
among which are Frankenstein, Valperga, The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck, etc. 
They belong to the sensational class. Frankenstein, otherwise named The Modern 
Prometheus, is among the first of what might be called the galvanic novels, i. e. novels 
in which the occult, demoniacal forces of nature play a leading part. Germany is the 
birthplace of such vagaries. Frankenstein is the result of a compact between the 
authoress, Byron, and Shelley himself, that each should write a romance in imitation 
of the German school. In Mrs. Shelley's work, the hero discovers the secret of life 
and generation, and actually succeeds in creating a man-monster, who is the agent 
of numerous horrid performances. Mrs. Shelley's Rambles in Germany, etc., form a 
pleasing account of her travels with her husband. 

Keats. 

John Keats, 1796-1821, was a poet of great promise, who died be- 
fore reaching the full maturity of his powers. 

Cnreer. — Keats was a native of Moorfields, London. He received a meagre clas- 
sical education, and was apprenticed in his fifteenth year to a surgeon, but soon aban- 
doned medicine for literature. He made the acquaintanceship of Leigh Hunt, then 
editor of The Examiner, and published some effusions in that periodical. In 1817, he 
published a volume of poems dedicated to Hunt. In 1818 appeared Endymion, a Po- 



THE POETS. 383 

etical Romance. This work was reviewed with unsparing severity by Gifford, in the 
Quarterly Review, and many, misled by the allusion in Byron's Don Juan and by Shel- 
ley's lines, have supposed that the shock thus given to Keats's sensibilities was the 
cause of his speedy death. It is now generally believed, however, that Keats would 
have died early in any case, as his constitution was of the frailest. 

Other Works. — In 1820 he published a second volume, containing Lamia, The 
Eve of St. Agnes, Hyperion, and several minor poems. Keats's merits and defects as 
a poet are now generally understood and acknowledged. Endymion has many rich 
passages, but, as a whole, is weak. Hyperion and The Eve of St. Agnes display im- 
mense progress, and there is every reason for supposing that, had the author been per- 
mitted to ripen to maturity, he would have added another to the list of great English 
poets. As it is, he falls just short of greatness. 

Of Keats's minor poems the most admired are the Lines on Chapman's Homer, The 
Ode to a Nightingale, The Ode to a Gi-ecian Urn. Keats is distinguished for his sensu- 
ous warmth, the play of his imagery, and his exquisite ear for harmony. 

Kirke White, 

Henry Kirke White, 1785-1806, gave in very early life evidence 
of poetical genius, but died before accomplishing anything of perma- 
nent value. 

He was the son of a butcher, and attracted attention by his precocity. Throiigh the 
influence of friends he was placed at Cambridge, where his health was ruined by ex- 
cessive study, and he sank into an early grave. During his lifetime he had published 
several poetical pieces in local magazines, and also a volume of poetry, entitled Clif- 
ton Grove. This was criticized by the London Monthly Review in what the poet's 
friend Southey called "cruel and insulting" terms, although it can scarcely be said 
that the reviewer exceeded his province. After White's death his unpublished pieces 
were edited by Southey, with a biographical sketch, under the title. Remains of Henry 
Kirke White. His Correspondence has also been published. 

White's place is among those poets who attract us more through sympathy with 
their adverse fate than by the intrinsic value of their productions. His poems unques- 
tionably possess merit, but not such merit as entitles the poet to rank in the first or 
even the second class. It is idle, of course, to speculate upon what White might have 
become, had his faculties had a fair chance to develop and mature. Judged by what 
he actually accomplished, we must admit that he has left us nothing profound, or 
even intensely passionate. His verses are rather plaintive and agreeable than vigor- 
ous. The best known of them are : The Star of Bethlehem, To an Early Primrose, 
Song of the Consumptive, Savoyard's Return, etc. 

Campbell. 

Thomas Campbell, 1777-1844, has an honored place 
among the fixed stars of the poetical firmament. His poems 
are not so considerable in amount as those of some other 
writers. But there is an excellence and finish in all that 
he did write that secures for him a permanent place in 
letters. 



384 SCOTT AND HIS CONTE MPOE ARIES. 

Career. — Campbell was born and educated in Glasgow, and was early 
distinguished for his proficiency in classical studies. His first publication, 
The Pleasures of Hope, at once gave him rank as a poet of mark. 
Being on a visit to the continent, he was a spectator of the battle of 
Hohenlinden, and commemorated the scene in the brilliant poem with 
which we are all familiar. While abroad, he wrote two other of his 
most popular lyrics. Ye Mariners of England, and The Exile of Erin. 
On returning to Scotland, he wrote Lochiel's Warning ; subsequently 
appeared Gertrude of Wyoming ; The Battle of the Bahic ; The Pil- 
grim of Glencoe, and other Poems. 

As a lyric and didactic poet, Campbell has few superiors in English 
literature. Several of his poems seem absolutely perfect. 

Campbell has written voluminously in prose also. Lectures on Poetry; Speci- 
mens of the British Poets, with Biographical and Critical Notices, 7 vols., 8vo ; Life 
of Mrs. Siddons ; Life and Times of Petrarch; Life of Shakespeare; A Poet's Resi- 
dence in Algiers; Letters from the South. He edited also, for a time, the Metropoli- 
tan Magazine, and the New Monthly Magazine. His Lectures on Poetry and the 
critical remarks in his Selections from the Poets, form together a most valuable body 
of poetical criticism by one who was himself a great master of the art of poetry. 

In 1827 he was elected Lord Rector of the University of Glasgow. " It was deep 
snow when he reached the college-green; the students were drawn up in parties, 
pelting one another; the poet ran into the ranks, threw several balls with unerring 
aim, then summoning the scholars around him in the hall, delivered a speech replete 
with philosophy and eloquence." — Allan Cunningham. 



Rogers. 

Samuel Rogers, 1763-1855, the banker, poet, art collector, 
and giver of breakfasts, is as well known by his Pleasures 
of Memory as is Campbell by the Pleasures of Hope. 

Career. — Eogers was the son of a banker, and inherited, with his 
younger brother, a profitable business, from the active management 
of Avhich he retired when little more than thirty. The remaining 
sixty years of his protracted life were passed in the cultivation of 
letters, the arts, and society. He gathered around his social board all 
that was genial and distinguished in each successive generation. Like 
Henry Crabb Pobinson, he remained a bachelor. Indeed, there is 
throughout the lives of both a striking parallelism. There is, how- 
ever, this difference, that E-ogers is known chiefly by his original works, 
Eobinson by his diary. Rogers, it is true, published a volume of Ee- 
collections, but they are not equal in continuity and fulness to Eobin- 
son's celebrated journal. 



THE POETS. 385 

WorJis. — Kogers evinced poetical talents while still very young. He published a 
series of eight papers, the Scribbler, in the Geutleman's Magazine for 1781. In 1786 
appeared An Ode to Superstition, in which were prefigured the poet's peculiar quali- 
ties. In 1792 appeared The Pleasures of Memory, which was at once warmly received 
by critic and public. Byron, in 1809, in his English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, 
pronounced it and I'ope's Essay on Man " the most didactic poems in our language," 
and, in 1813, dedicated his Giaour to Rogers. Sir James Mackintosh and Professor 
Wilson were also among the conspicuous admirers of the Pleasures of Memory. 
Jacqueline, a pastoral tale, was published with Byron's Lara, in 1813. Human Life 
appeared in 1819. Rogers's chief work, however, is his Italy, published 1822-3. Ap- 
pearing anonymously, it was ascribed by some to Sonthey. 

Estimate of Jiis T'oetry. — Rogers's poetry has lost in favor. The present 
generation demands something stronger and deeper than easy descriptions and com- 
monplace reflections. Rogers is a finished versifier, and his lines betray a cultured 
mind. Especially in his Italy does he show himself to be a man of great liberality 
in his judgments of what might have been distasteful to him as an Englisliman and 
a Protestant. There can be no doubt that he has exercised a wholesome influence, 
indirectly, upon the development of English literature, by widening the range of 
its sympathies and its cidture. When we compare him, however, with his really 
great contemporaries, Byron, Wordsworth, Shelley, Coleridge, we can scarcely fail to 
perceive that he was lacking in real poetic inspiration. 



Southey. 

Robert Soutliey, 1774-1843, was another of the great lit- 
erary celebrities in the earlier part of the present century. 
His fame and fortunes are intimately associated with those 
of Coleridge and Wordsworth. He was not equal to either 
of them in genius, but he had abilities of a high order. He 
was methodical and unwearied in labor, and he made him- 
self, while he lived, a magnate in the world of letters. 

Career. — Southey was educated by his aunt, Miss Tyler, an eccen- 
tric lady who had a passion for the theatre. At a very early age, 
Southey became familiar with Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher, and 
the great body of English dramatists. Sent to Westminster School, he 
was expelled for a satire on corporal punishment, published in the 
school paper. He afterwards went to Oxford, and embraced enthusi- 
astically radical and Unitarian doctrines. It was at this time that he 
wrote the notorious " Wat Tyler," which was not published, however, 
until much later, and then surreptitiously. At the University he made 
the acquaintance of Coleridge. His aunt, a Tory, turned him away 
on account of his religious and political heresies. He formed, with 
Coleridge, the plan of founding a " pantisocracy " in Pennsylvania, 
33 Z 



386 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

already referred to, but, as neither of them had any money, the plan 
was abandoned. 

In 1795, vSouthey, who had just married Miss Fricker, joined his 
uncle, Eev. Mr. Hill, then chaplain to the British embassy in Portugal, 
and remained on the Peninsula some six months. It was at this time 
that he laid the foundation for his knoAvledge of the Romance lan- 
guages and literature. 

He returned to England, and, after essaying the study of the law 
for a brief period, finally settled down to literary occupation. He 
fixed his residence in 1803 at Greta Hall, not far from Wordsworth, 
in that lovely region which has become famous under the name of 
the " lake district " of England. Here, in literary labor and seclusion, 
he passed the remainder of his days. 

The once enthusiastic radical and Unitarian now became the staunch 
supporter of Church and State. Southey was sincere and unselfish, 
however, in his conversion, and a generous friend to Coleridge, and 
many other needy poets and writers. 

Southey's intercourse with Wordsworth was interrupted only by 
death. In 1839 he married his second wife. Miss Bowles, also a writer. 
Soon after that, his mind gave way under the strain to which it had 
been put by protracted literary cares, and the remaining three years 
of his life were passed in hopeless imbecility. 

Sis Tiiteruvy Character. — Southey's works are extrerQe]y Toluminous, both 
in prose and verse, and cover a wide range of subjects. Southey the poet, so famous 
in his day, and ranked with "Wordsworth, Byron, Scott, and Coleridge, is now compar- 
atively ignored. His extravagance and want of naturalness are repugnant to the 
tastes of this realistic age. His poems abound in beautiful and striking passages, but 
are faulty in conception and tedious in execiTtion, Some of his prose works, on the 
contrary, such as the Life of Nelson and The Life of Wesley, will always i-ank among 
English prose classics. The Doctor is a queer book, full of whimsicalities and bits of 
wisdom, but, as a whole, rather tiresome. No one of Southey's professedly literary 
works, however, surpasses in interest his Correspondence. His Wat Tyler, a Jaco- 
binical effusion of Southey's Oxford days, was published in 1817, surreptitiously, after 
the author had changed his views : it created much excitement, and was even de- 
nounced in Parliament. 

WorJcs. — The list of his principal works would probably embrace the following: 
in verse, Joan of Arc, Thalaba, The Cid (translated from the Spanish), The Curse of 
Kehania, Roderick, the Last of the Goths ; in prose, a History of the Peninsular War, 
History of Brazil, Essays, Moral and Political. The Doctor, Espriella's Letters from 
England (a pretended translation from the Spanish), and the lives of Nelson, Wesley, 
Kirke White, and Cowper. In addition to these and other long pieces, Southey is the 
author of many short poems and sketches. 

Sis Matili as a Writer. — In his life, opinions, and writings, Southey is a type 
pf literary England during and Jifter the Napoleonic wars. He was classified -vvitli 



THE POETS. 387 

Coleridge and Wordsworth by the Edinburgh Review, under the so-called " lake 
poets." The epithet, although at first sight appropriate, — the trio residing in the 
lake district and associating with one another intimately for years, — is substantially 
incorrect and unfortunate. It would be impossible to find in English history any 
other three contemporaries that have so few features in common and who have bor- 
rowed so little inspiration one from the other. 

" An English worthy, doing his duty for fifty noble years of labor, day by day stor- 
ing up learning, day by day working for scant wages, most charitable out of his small 
means, bravely faithful to the calling whicli he had chosen, refusing to turn from his 
path for popular praise or prince's power; — I mean Robert Southey. We have left his 
old political landmarks miles and miles behind; we protest against his dogmatism; 
nay, we begin to forget it and his politics ; but I hope his life will not be forgotten, 
for it is sublime in its simplicity, its energy, its honor, its affection ! In the combat 
between Time and Thalaba, I suspect the former destroyer has conquered; Kehama's 
curse frightens very few readers now; but Southey's private letters are worth piles 
of epics, and are sure to last among us as long as kind hearts like to sympathize with 
goodness and purity and love and upright life." — Thadceray. 

Mrs. Carolhste Anne Southey, 1787-1854, better known as Caro- 
line Bowles, is favorably known as a writer both of prose and verse. 

Mrs Southey was the daughter of Captain Charles Bowles. She was married to 
Robert Southey in 1839. She cultivated authorship both before and after marriage, 
contributing chiefly to Blackwood's Magazine. The best known of her prose writings 
are four tales, — The Young Grey-Head, The Murder Glen, Walter and William, and 
The Evening Walk. Her poems also are very popular, such as Autumn Flowers, Soli- 
tary Hours, etc. 

"If Mrs. Norton is the Byron, Mrs. Southey (Caroline Bowles) is the Cowper of our 
modern poetesses. She has much of that great writer's humor, fondness for rural 
life, melancholy pathos, and moral satire. She has also Cowper's pre-eminently Eng- 
lish manner in diction and thought." — Hartley Coleridge. 

Coleridge. 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1772-1834, was, of all the con- 
temporary writers, the man most endowed by nature with 
genius. But the fitful and irregular character of his mental 
action prevented his accomplishing any great and completed 
work commensurate with his acknowledged genius. His 
poetic fame rests on two poems, both of singular, almost su- 
pernatural power ; yet one, Christabel, is only a fragment, 
tbe other. The Rime of the Ancieut Mariner, more nearly 
complete in itself, is only a part of an incompleted whole. 
The like is true of his prose writings, — they are, at the best, 
only splendid fragments. 



388 SCOTT AND HIS CONTE MPOR AEIES. 

Career. — Coleridge was at first a pupil of Christ Hospital, where 
he gained distmction for scholarship, as he did afterwards when a stu- 
dent at Cambridge. But being disappointed in a love-affair wliile at 
the University, he left the place without graduation, and enlisted by 
stealth in the army, under an assumed name. A scrap of Latin which 
he scribbled on the stable-wall of the barracks betrayed his disguise, 
and led to his being released from his false position and restored to his 
friends. 

Soon after, in 1794, he became intimate with Souther. Both of 
them at that time were ardent republicans, and admirers of the French 
Revolution. Both also were Unitaiians in religion. Xeedy, restless, 
and full of the spirit of adventure, the young poets devised a scheme of 
emigrating with some friends to America, and there founding ou the 
bank of the Susquehanna a Utopian republic, or Pantisocracy, the dis- 
tinguishing feature of which should be a community of goods. Having 
no money to carry out the romantic project, Coleridge began writing 
for the Morning Post ; he published also a volume of poems, and gave 
lectures at Bristol, on moral and political subjects. He and Southey 
also married sisters, the Misses Fricker of Bristol. Coleridge at this 
time preached occasionally for the Unitarians at Bristol. 

Through the liberality of Josiah and Thomas Wedge wood, the well- 
known potters, Coleridge was enabled in 1798 to go to Germany, where 
he studied with great diligence in the University of Gottingen. On 
returning to England, he settled at Keswick, in the Lake District of 
Westmoreland, where also Southey and Wordsworth resided. Hence 
the^e three friends have been called the Lake Poets. 

A few years later, Coleridge renounced Unitarianism, and adopted 
the creed of the Anglican Church ; he made a like change in his politi- 
cal opinions, having become disgusted with the excesses of the French 
Eepublicans. 

La 1808 Coleridge lectured on Shakespeare and the Fine Arts, in the 
Eoyal Institution, London. He began soon after a periodical. The 
Friend. His habits of living being irregular, and his health failing, 
he fell into the way of taking opium, which added greatly to his other 
infirmities, and made him for years a most pitiable spectacle. He was 
rescued from this condition, however, and spent his declining years in 
the hospitable refuge of a generous physician. Dr. GUman, of London. 

JEstimate of Hitn. — The universal testimony of competent judges is that Cole- 
ridge's natural endowments were of the very highest order. Method and industry, 
such method and industry as mark the career of Tennyson, of Milton, and of Shake- 
speare, would have made him the equal, possibly the superior, of any of these great 
men. Even from the desultory and fitful efforts of his genius which remain, he must 



THE POETS. 389 

be regarded as one of the great men of all time. His po"u-er3 as a conversationist, or 
Tiither as a talker, for he did not converse, have probably never been equalled ; and 
had there been a Boswell to gather up all these brilliant sayings which fell from his 
lips, the record would have be^u of inestimable value. Much of his conversation has 
been preserved in the Table-Talk, published after his decease. But we have no such 
minute report as that which Bossvell gave of Dr. Johnson. 

Wod'Jcs, — Coleridge's works are chiefly the following : The Eime of the Ancient 
Mariner; Christabel; Genevieve; Semoi-se, a Tragedy; Aids to Reflection; Lectures 
on Shakespeare; Constitution of Church and State; The Statesman's Manual ; Con- 
fessions of an Inquiring Spirit ; Theory of Life : Essays on his Own Times; The Friend, 
several volumes ; LaySermuns; Tabie-Talk; Biographia Literaria ; Literary Kemains. 

"This illustrious man, the largest and most spacious intellect, the subtlest and 
most comprehensive, in my judgment, that has yet existed among men.'" — De Quinccy. 

" His mind contains an astonishing map of all sorts of knowledge, while, in his 
power and manner of putting it to use, he displays more of what we mean by the 
term genius than any mortal I ever saw, or ever expect to see." — John Foster. 

" I shall never forget the effect his first conversation made upon me. It struck me 
as something not only out of the ordinary course of things, but as an intellectual ex- 
hibition altogether matchless. The party was unusually large, but the presence of 
Coleridge concentrated ail attention towards himself. The viands were unusually costly, 
and the banquet was at once rich and varied; but there seemed to be no dish hke 
Coleridge's conversation to feed upon — and no infomiation so varied as his own. The 
orator rolled himself up, as it were, in his chair, and gave the most unrestrained in- 
dulgence to his speech, — and how fraught with acuteness and originality wiis that 
speech, and in what copious periods did it flow ! The auditors seemed to be rapt in 
wonder and delight, as one observation more profound, or clothed in more forcible 
language than another, fell from his tongue. For nearly two hours he spoke with 
unhesitating and uninterrupted fluency. . . . I i-egretted that I could not exercise the 
powers of a second Boswell, to record the wisdom and the eloquence which had that 
evening flowed fi-om the orator's lips. It haunted me as I retired to rest. It drove 
away slumber." — Dibdin. 

Hartley Coleridge, 1796-1849, eldest son of tlie poet S. T. Cole- 
ridge, was liimself also a poet of liigh excellence. 

He lived in seclusion at Grasmere, occupying himself with literary pursuits. He 
was a precocious child, giving utterance in early youth to thoughts and expressions 
entirely beyond his years. He was physically deformed, and in his mental organiza- 
tion there was something irregular ; in disposition also he was wayward. He achieved 
distinction at Oxford, and was elected to a Fellowship, but forfeited it by habits of in- 
temperance. His conversational powers are said to have been great, and the effect 
was heightened by the gTotesqneness of his personal appearance and the di-eamy 
oddity of his manners. " It is impossible to ^ive you any adequate idea of his oddity ; 
for he is the oddest of all God's creations, and he grows quainter every day." — Southey. 

Worlis. — He wrote a good deal for Blackwood. His separate publications are; 
Poems; Biographia Borealis, or Lives of Distinguished Northmen; "Worthies of York- 
shire and Lancashire ; Life of Andi'cw Marvell ; Essays and Marginalia (edited by 
Derwent C). 

"Though wo do not rank Hartley Coleridge with the greatest poets, the most pro- 
found thinkers, or the most brilliant essayists, yet we know of no single man who has 
33* 



390 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

left, as his legacy to the world, at once poems so graceful, thoughts so just, and essays 
so delectable." — Fraser's Magazine. 

Rev. Derwent Coleridge, 1800 , another son of the poet Samuel Taylor C, was 

a clergyman of the English Church, and Principal of St. Mark's College, Chelsea. 
Works : The Scriptural Character of the English Church ; Notes on English Divines; 
Lay Sermons. He edited also S. T. Coleridge's Poems and Dramatic Works. 

William Hart Coleridge, 1790-1850, supposed to be a cousin of the poet S. T. Cole- 
ridge, was educated at Oxford, and became Bishop of Bai'badoes in 1841. He published 
Address to Candidates for Holy Orders ; Charges delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese 
of the Barbadoes ; Sermons, etc. 

Henry Nelson Coleridge, 1800-1843, nephew, and literary executor, of the poet S. 
T. C, was a Fellow of King's College, Cambridge, and a lawyer by profession. He 
accompanied his uncle, William H. C, Bishop of Barbadoes, on his voyage to the W. 
Indies. He wrote : Six Months in the West Indies ; and An Introduction to the Study 
of the Great Classic Poets. He also contributed to the London Quarterly Review, 
But his chief literary labor consisted in collecting and editing the various literary re- 
mains of his uncle, the great poet. These were: Literary Remains, 4 vols. ; Confes- 
sions of an Inquiring Spirit; The Friend, 3 vols.; Constitution of Church and State; 
Biographia Literaria. The editing of the work last named was begun by him and 
finished by his widow, Sarah, who was his cousin, and a daughter of the poet. 

Sarah Henry Coleridge, 1803-1852, daughter of the poet S. T. Coleridge, and wife of 
his nephew, H. N. Coleridge, wrote Pretty Lessons for Good Children ; Phantasmion, 
a tale ; and a translation from the Latin of The Albipones of Paraguay. Her chief 
merit, however, was in the aid she gave in editing the literary remains of her illus- 
trious father. 

Sir John Taylor Coleridge, 1790 , also a nephew of the poet S. T. Coleridge, 

and a man of great distinction in the legal profession, became a Judge of the Court 
of the Queen's Bench in 1835, and a Member of the Privy Council in 1858. He pub- 
lished an edition of Blackstone, with notes, 

Joanna Baillie. 

Joanna Baillie, 1764-1851, was a dramatist of great ce- 
lebrity, contemporary with Sir Walter Scott, Sir James 
Mackintosh, Jeffrey, Southey, Byron, and Coleridge, and 
was eminent even among those great names. 

She was horn near Glasgow, Scotland, but spent most of her life and 
achieved her principal literary successes in the neighborhood of Lon- 
don. 

Her dramas were published under the title of Plays on the Passions, her plan being 
to make each p ission the subject of two plays, a tragedy and a comedy. Besides these 
she published a volume of Miscellaneous Dramas ; The Family Legend, a Tragedy ; 
Poetic Miscellanies; Metrical Legends of Exalted Characters; and A Yiew of the 
General Tenor of the New Testament regarding the Nature and Dignity of Jesus Christ. 



THE POETS. 391 

Her chief works were those first named, Plays on the Passions. "A noble monu- 
ment of the powerful mind and the pure and elevated imagination of its autlior." — 
Edinburgh Review. 

The Family Legend was acted both in Edinburgh and London with great success. 
On the occasion of its performance in Edinburgh, Scott wrote: "We wept till our 
hearts were sore, and applauded till our hands were blistered." Her dramas, how- 
ever, are rather intended for reading than for representation. She herself did not 
frequent the theatre, and was not familiar with its arrangements. As reading plays, 
they are accepted by the highest critical authorities as among the grandest works of 
the poetical art. 

Mrs. Hemans. 

Mrs. Felicia Dorothea Hemans, 1794-1835, was, during 
her life, a leading favorite, her poems being read, admired, 
and quoted by almost everybody, and on almost all occa- 
sions. 

Career, — Mrs. Hemans was a native of Liverpool, daughter of a 
Mr. Browne, a merchant of that city. She began writing at a very- 
early age, and a volume of her poems, Early Blossoms, was published 
before she had reached fifteen. She was at that time singularly beau- 
tiful in appearance and attractive in manners. 

She Avas married at eighteen to Captain Hemans, of the British army. 
The union was not a happy one, and, after living together for six years, 
they separated. Captain Hemans went to Italy to take care of him- 
self, and remained there ; Mrs. Hemans remained at home to rear and 
educate the five sons who were the fruits of their ill-assorted marriage. 
It redounds to her honor certainly that these domestic infelicities found 
no voice in her song. She bore her griefs in dignified silence, and did 
not, like Byron, coin her heart-pangs into marketable verse. 

Mrs. Hemans resided for some years with her sister and mother, and, after the death 
of the latter, spent the close of life at Dublin, where her brother, Major Browne, re- 
sided. She visited at different times Sir Walter Scott, Wordsworth, and other literary 
celebrities, and was a general favorite with them all. 

Worlis. — Mrs. Hemans wrote no long poems, but a large number of occasional 
pieces, and at the time of her death was an almost universal favorite, both in England 
and America. Even Sir Archibald Alison speaks of heras a rival to Coleridge! But 
her reputation has been steadily on the wane for the last thirty or forty years. Tiie 
truth is, she wrote pleasing things with infinite prottiness, but she had no true crea- 
tive genius. 

"It may not be the best imaginable poetry, and may not indicate the very high- 
est or most commanding genius ; but it embraces a great deal of that which gives the 
very best poetry its chief power of pleasing; and would strike us, perhaps, as more 
impassioned and exalted, if it were not regulated and harmonized by the most beau- 
tiful taste. It is infinitely sweet, elegant, and tender, — touching, perhaps, and con- 
templative, rather than vehement and overpowering; and not only finished through- 



392 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

out with an exquisite delicacy and even serenity of execution, but informed with a 
purity and loftiness of feeling, and a certain sober and humble tone of indulgence and 
piety, which must satisfy those who are most afraid of the passionate exaggerations 
of poetry. The diction is always beautiful, harmonious, and free ; and the themes, 
though of iufiuite variety, uniformly treated with a grace, originality, and judgment 
which marks the master-hand. We do not hesitate to say that she is, beyond all com- 
parison, the most touching and accomplished writer of occasional verses that our lit- 
erature has yet to boast of." — Lord Jeffrey. 

Mus. Anne Grant, 1755-1838, generally known as "Mrs. Grant 
of Laggan," was a writer of some note. 

Mrs. Grant was the daughter of Duncan McYicar, of the British army, and was a 
native of Glasgow. In 1758, her father having been ordered to America, she followed 
with her mother, and spent some years in Albany. There, at the age of eight, she 
made the acquaintance of '' Madame Schuyler," whom she has commemorated in one 
of her works. At the age of thirteen, she returned with her parents to Scotland, and 
at the age of twenty-four she was married to the Rev. James Grant, of Laggan. From 
Laggan she removed in 1810 to Edinburgh, at which latter place she remained till her 
death, at the age of eighty-four. 

Mrs. Grant was highly esteemed by Sir Walter Scott, Bishop Porteus, Sir Walter 
Farquhar, and others, and was for a long time one of the established celebrities of 
Edinburgh. The following are her principal works: The Highlanders and Other 
Poems; Eighteen Hundi-ed and Thirteen, a Poem ; Essays on the Superstitions of the 
Highlanders; Memoirs of an American Lady (Mrs. Schuyler); Letters from the Moun- 
tains '(being her correspondence with her friends). 

"Her writings, deservedly popular in her own country, derive their success from 
the happy maimer in which, addressing themselves to the national pride of the Scot- 
tish people, they breathe a spirit at once of patriotism and of that candor which ren- 
ders patriotism unselfish and liberal." — Sir Walter Scott. 

" Her poetry is really not very good : and the most tedious, and certainly the least . 
poetical, volume which she has produced, is that which contains her verses. The 
longest piece— whicli she has entitled The Highlanders — is heavy and uninterest- 
ing: and there is a want of compression and finish — a sort of loose, rambling, and 
indigested air — in most of the others. Yet the whole collection is enlivened with 
the sparklings of a prolific fancy, and displays great command of language and facility 
of versification." — Jeffrey. 

Elizabeth Landon. 

Letitia Elizabeth LxVndon, afterwards Mrs. Maclean, and gen- 
erally known as L. E. L., 1802-1838, was one of the literary celebri- 
ties in the early part of this century. 

She was a native of London, and daughter of Dr. Landon, Dean of Exeter. She 
began writing poetry at an early age, and became a stated contributor to the London 
Literary Gazette. In 183S, she was married to Mr. George Maclean, Governor of Cape 
Coast Castle, and sailed for her new home. There, in October of the same year, she 
died from an accidental overdose of prussic acid, — an article whicli she had been in 
the habit of taking for hysteric affections. 

Miss Landon had attained a high reputation, especially by her poetry, and was at 



THE POETS. 393 

the time of her death one of the celebrities of the literary world. She was undoubt- 
edly a woman of genius, and had she lived, she might have achieved substantial and 
permanent greatness. But her works, when read at the distance of thirty or forty 
years from the time of their composition, and apart from the romantic circumstances 
of her life, do not confirm the judgment of her contemporaries. 

Works. — The following list embraces most of her poems: Adelaide, a small Ko- 
mance ; To Be, and other Poems ; The Improvisatrice. and other Poems ; The Trouba- 
dour ; a Catalogue of Pictures and Historic Sketches ; The Golden Violet, and other 
Poems; The Venetian Bracelet; The Lost Pleiad; A History of the Lyre, etc. She 
wrote also several novels, Ethel Churchill, Francisco Carrara, The Vow of the Pea- 
cock, Romance and Reality, Traits and Trials of Early Life, Duty and Imagination, 
etc. Her poetical works have been collected in 4 vols., 8vo. After her death, a con- 
siderable number of her works appeared posthumously, besides The Zenana, and other 
Poems, with a Memoir by Emma Robert, and Life and Literary Remains, 2 vols., 8vo, 
by Laman Blanchard. 

" Her deficiency alike in judgment and taste made her wayward and capricious, and 
her efforts seemed frequently impulsive. Hence she gave to the public a great deal 
too much, — a large part other writings being destitute of that elaboration, care, and 
finish essentially necessary to the fine arts, even when in combination with the highest 
genius, to secure permanent success ; for the finest poetry is that which is sugges- 
tive, — the result as much of what has been studiously withheld as of what has been 
elaborately given. It is quite apparent, however, that L. E. L. had opened her eyes 
to these her defects, and was rapidly overcoming them; for her very last things — 
those published in her Remains by Laman Blanchard — are incomparably her best, 
whether we regard vigorous conception, concentration of ideas, or judicious selection 
of subject. Her faults originated in an enthusiastic temperament and an efflorescent 
fancy, and showed themselves, as miglit have been expected, in an uncurbed prodi- 
gality of glittering imagery, — her muse, untamed and untutored, ever darting in 
dalliance from one object to another, like the talismanic bird in the Arabian story." 
— Moir. 

Crabbe. 

George Crabbe, 1754-1832, is the poet of the poor and 
the lowly. Though not so much read as he once was, he 
Still holds his place as a favorite with the public. 

Career. — Crabbe was born in humble circumstances, and in working 
his way upward encountered many hardships. He was first appren- 
ticed to a surgeon, but disliking the business, and having an inward 
yearning for literary life, he left his lowly home in the country, and 
set out, with five pounds in his pocket, for London. Then he made 
sundry attempts to gain literary employment, but, like most needy ad- 
venturers in such circumstances, he met with a cold reception, and was 
almost in despair, when, as a last resort, he applied to Edmund Bnrke. 
Burke listened to his story, and being satisfied that his abilities Avere 
of a high order, gave him prompt and effective support. 

By the advice of Burke, Crabbe prepared himself for lioly orders and 
entered the ministry. He also became acquainted with the distin- 



394 SCOTT AXD HIS COXTEMPOEAEIES. 

giiislied men wlio formed Burke's circle of friends, Thurlow, Fox, Eev- 
nolds, Johnson, and others. By these means, he obtained ecclesias- 
tical patronage, and a recognition of his literary merits. The Librarv, 
which first appeared, was favorably received, and brought him sub- 
stantial returns. After several changes in his clerical position, he 
finally settled down in a pleasant country parish in Wiltshire. 

WorJcs. — The first poem that obtaiued a marked success was The Village. It con- 
tained vivid descriptions of scenes among the poor, such as he himself had been familiar 
with, and it was instantly and thoroughly popular. After that, whatever he produced 
was in demand. His other poems are: The Parish Register. The Borough, Tales iu 
Verse, and Tales of the Hall. On bringing out the one last named, Murray the pub- 
lisher gave him for it, and for the unexpired term of the former copyrights, the sura 
of £3000. Mr. Crabbe had naturally a cheerful disposition, and the close of his life 
was calm and peaceful. 

The chief characteristic of his poetry is the extreme accuracy of the descriptions, 
and his partiality for subjects which are iu themselves dull and even forbidding. He 
was undoubtedly a poet of great power and even, at times, of tenderness, but his 
pathos is usually linked to something coarse and humiliating. The reader is affected, 
but he is not di-awn to read a second time. 

Heber. 

Reginald Heber, D. D., 1783-1826, is justly celebrated 
for his noble work as a missionary Bishop in India, and for 
his missionary hymn, " From Greenland's icy mountains." 

Career. — Heber was educated at Oxford, where he was distinguished 
for his classical scholarsliip, and for the elegance of his English style. 
His learning, accomplishments, and genius would have insured him 
high preferment in the chm'ch, had he remained at home. In accept- 
ing the Bishopric at Calcutta, he was influenced by the true self-deny- 
ing spirit of a Christian minister, and he entered upon its duties with 
the greatest zeal. He died in India, at the early age of forty-three. 

WorJis. — The following are his principal works : Palestine, a Poem, which gained 
a prize at Oxford, while tlie author was a student there; Europe, Lines on the 
Present War, 1S09 ; Hymns, adapted to the Weekly Church Service ; A Journey through 
India, 2 vols.. 4to : Sermons, several volumes. Bishop Heber was one of the most ac- 
complished and scholarly divines that the Church of England has produced in modern 
times. His one Missionary Hymn, however, will survive all else that he wrote or did, 
and will carry his memory to the latest generation. 

"Fine as some of these ("Oxford) prize poems have unqupstionahly been, more espe- 
cially Porteus's Death, Glynn"s Day of Judgment, Grant's Restoi'ation of Learning, and 
Wranghams Holy Land, still, it is doubtful whether Heber has been equalled either 
by any preceding or succeeding competitor. It is admirably sustained throughout-; 
and indeed the passages relating to tlie buildino: of tlie Temple, and to the scenes on 
Calvary, pass from the magnificent almost into the sublime." — Moir. 



THE POETS. 395 

" These Hymns have been bj' far the most popular of his prochictions, and deservedly 
so; for iu purity and elevation of sentiment, in Simple pathos, and iu eloquent earnest- 
ness, it would be difficult to find anything superior to them in the range of lyric 
poetry. Tliey have the home-truth of Watts, but rank much higher as literary com- 
positions than the Moral and Divine Songs of that great benefactor of youth ; and all 
the devotion of Wesley or Keble, without their langiiage and diffuse verbosity, llebcr 
always writes like a Christian scholar, and never finds it necessary to lower his tone 
on account of his subject." — Moir. 

"This is another book for Englishmen to be proud of. He surveys everything with 
the vigilance and delight of a cultivated and most active intellect, — with the eye of an 
artist, an antiquary, and a naturalist, — the feelings and judgment of an English gen- 
tleman and scholar, — the sympathies of a most humane and generous man, — and the 
piety, charity, and humility of a Christian. Independently of its moral attraction, we 
are induced to think it, on the whole, the most instructive and important publication 
that has ever been given to the world on the actual state and condition of our Indian 
Empire." — Lord Jeffrey. 

Hogg. 
James Hogg, 1770-1835, is known as " The Ettrick Sliepherd." 

Hogg was born in a cottage on the banks of the Ettrick River in Selkirkshire, Scot- 
land. The only regular education that the young poet received was six montlis' 
schooling before he was eight years old. His early life he passed as a shepherd in the 
service of Mr. Laidlaw. Some of his poems happening to fall into the hands of Sir 
Walter Scott, attracted that author's attention. One of his songs, Donald McDonald, 
was set to music and was widely spread. He also contributed to Sir Walter Scott's 
Border Minstrelsy. 

In 1813 Hogg published his most celebrated work, The Queen's Wake, a collection 
of seventeen ballads, and subsequently a number of scattered pieces. He also wrote 
several stories in prose, the principal of which is the Brownie of Bodstock, and he 
projected a series of Altrive peasant tales, only one volume of which was published. 

Like Burns, Hogg was at one time the lion of Scotch society. The latter part of his 
life was spent in rustic retirement. Hogg's poetry has received its full measure of 
praise, and although no longer the fashion is still much read and enjoyed. The poems 
are by no means equal in execution, biit those that are good are very good — the 
sparkling emanations of a pure poetic fancy. 

Bloomfield. 

Robert Bloomfield, 1766-1823, an unlettered shoemaker, wliile 
working in a garret with six or seven others, composed a poem. The 
Farmer's Boy, which set all England ablaze, and made its author, for 
the time, '' the observed of all observers." 

In three years, twenty-six thousand copies of The Farmer's Boy were sold, — an enor- 
mous sale for those days, — and the book was reprinted on the continent, besides 
being translated into French, Italian, and Latin. The whole of tliis poem was com- 
posed in the author's head and completed, before a line of it was written. He c(.)uld 
at first find no publisher for it, but succeeded at length through the patronage of 
Capel Lolft, a man of wealth as well as of letters, who saw the merits of the work. 



396 COWPER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Relieved from the necessities of manual labor, Bloomfield devoted himself to author- 
ship, and produced several other works, but none equal to his first. Among them 
Rural Tales, Ballads and Songs; Good Tidings, or News from the Farm; Wild Flow- 
ers ; Banks of the Wye ; May-Day with the Muses. 

The verdict of the critics as to the merits of The Farmer's Boy has been almost 
unanimous. Of our uneducated poets, who have risen to fame, he stands next prob- 
ably to Burns, though certainly at a long distance below Burns. "In true pastoral 
imagery and simplicity, I do not think any production can be put in competition 
with it since the days of Theocritus." — Dr. Nathan Drake. " The Farmer's Boy is 
by far the best written, as to style and composition, of any of the works of our un- 
educated poets. The melody of the versification is often exceedingly beautiful." — 
Blackwood. 

Bloomfield is not much read now. The quiet scenes of country life which he de- 
scribes are too tame to suit the present taste. Besides, the universal and romantic 
circumstances attending his introduction to the literary world led naturally, for a 
time, to an exaggerated estimate. His work was compared, not with the great works 
of all time, but with what might be expected from a poor, uneducated laborer, 
working in his garret in the daily toil and struggle for bread. 

Pollok. 

Egbert Pollok, 1799-1827, acquired for a time a prodigious repu- 
tation by his poem. The Course of Time. 

Pollok was a native of Scotland. He studied at the University of Glasgow, and 
was about entering the ministry when cut down by disease, brought on by excessive 
study. Pollok is the author of three stories, collected under the name of the Tales 
of the Covenanters, now but little read, and of The Course of Time, a poem which has 
been widely spread throughout Scotland and America. 

Tlte Course ofTinte.— lhis poem was at one time a great favorite, and is still 
read and admired by many. The commonly received opinion is that it has many good 
and even brilliant passages, but that, as a whole, it is weak in conception, and weak 
in execution. It is the work of an immature mind. In passing judgment upon The 
Course of Time, however, it should be kept in mind that its author died too young to 
reach maturity. For one of his age it is certainly a remarkable production, leaving 
on the mind of the reader a deep regret that Pollok could not have attained to full 
development. 

John Finlay, 1782-1810, a poet of some note, was born in Glas- 
gow, and studied at the University there. 

Finlay died young. He wrote Wallace, or the Vale of Ellerslie ; Scottish Historical 
and Romantic Ballads; Life of Cervantes. "His chief poem, Wallace, which was 
written at the age of nineteen, is doubtless an imperfect composition ; but it displays 
a wonderful power of versification, and contains many splendid descriptions of ex- 
ternal nature. It possesses both the merits and defects which we look for in the early 
compositions of true genius. The collection of Historical and Romantic Ballads 
entitles Finlay to a place among Scottish antiquaries, and to follow those of Walter 
Scott and Robert Jamieson." — Blackwood. 

Jeremiah Holme Wiffin, 1792-1836, was a member of the Society of Friends. He 



THE POETS. 397 

was born at Woburn, Bedfordshire. After teaching school for several years, he be- 
came librarian to the Duke of Bedford, and continued in that position till his death. 
He was a poet, and a diligent student of the poetry of Spain and Italy. He published 
Aonian Hours and Other Poems ; Julian Alpinula, the Captive of Stamboul ; The 
Works of Garcilasso de la Vega, translated into English verse, with a critical and 
historical essay on Spanish poetry ; Jerusalem Delivered, a translation from the Italian 
of Tasso in Spenserian stanza. " The best scholar among a' the Quakers is Friend 
"VViffin, a capital translator, Sir Walter tells me, o' poets wi' foreign tongues, sic as 
Tawso, and wi' an original vein, too, sir, which has produced, as I opine, some verra 
pure ore." — The Eitrick Shepherd in Nodes Ambros. 

William Sotheby, 1757-1833, was a native of London. He was educated at Harrow; 
entered the royal army, but resigned in 1780. Sotheby was a man of high literary 
and general culture, genial in his manners, and possessed of ample means to gratify 
hiSi hospitable tastes. 

Sotheby's talent might be called imitative rather than original. Not that he was 
ever guil+y of literai-y theft, but that he succeeded better in his translations than in 
his originiJ yieces. The latter are numerous and smoothly written. He published a 
volume of poewy descriptive of a tour through Wales, The Battle of the Nile, Cuzco, 
Julian and Agnes, Coisstance of Castile, Five Tragedies, and one or two other poetical 
works or dramafic works, which were well received on the occasion of their appear- 
ance, but which are now little i-ead. 

Sotheby's translations are still in favor. They comprise Wieland's Oberon (much 
praised by the author), Virgil's Georgics, Specimens from Homer, and afterwards the 
entire Iliad and Odyssey. He also published Virgil's Georgics in a six-language edi- 
tion, namely, in the original, and in Italian, Spanish, German, French, and English 
translations. Sotheby is a careful translator, adhering closely to the original, but 
occasionally becoming stiff. It may be doubted, however, whetlier the English lan- 
guage has in the main any better renderings of such originals as Homer, Virgil, and 
Wieland than those contributed by Sotheby. 

Bowles. 

Eev. William Lisle Bowles, 1762 - 1850, published in 1793 a 
small volume of Sonnets, only fourteen in number, which, besides being 
exquisitely beautiful in themselves, had the honor of contributing 
materially to mould the poetry of the three great masters, Coleridge, 
Southey, and Wordsworth. 

Coleridge, whose first poetic impulses were in a false direction, acknowledged him- 
self to have been withdrawn from his errors by his admiration for the tender and 
manly beauty of these poems. Southey acknowledges his obligation to the same 
source. "We have ourselves heard from Woi'dsworth's own lips, that he got posses- 
sion of the same Sonnets one morning when he was setting out with some friends on 
a pedestrian tour from London ; and that so captivated was he with their beauty that 
he retreated into one of the recesses in Westminster Bridge, and could not be in- 
duced to rejoin his companions till he had finished them." — Gent. Mag. 

"The Sonnets of Bowles may be reckoned among the first fruits of a new era in 
poetry. ... In these Sonnets there was observed a grace of expression, a musical 
versification, and especially an air of melancholy tenderness, so congenial to the poet- 
ical temperament, which still, after sixty years of a more propitious period than that 
34 



398 cow PER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Avhich immediately preceded tlieir publication, procures for their author a highly 
respectable position among our authors." — Henry Hallam. 

Mr. Bowles published, at different times, a good deal, both prose and verse. One 
of his piiblications, an edition of Pope, led to a warm literary controversy. In his 
notes upon Pope, Mr. Bowles insisted strongly on the descriptive in poetry as being 
an esseutial element. To one of his dogmas, especially that " all images drawn from 
what is beautiful or sublime in the works of nature, are more beautiful and sublime 
than any images drawn from art; and that they are therefore per se more poetical,"' 
Campbell and Byron took strong exceptions, Byron replying that a ship in the wind, 
with all sail set, is a more poetical object than a hog in the wind, though the hug is 
all nature, and the ship all art. The controversy growing out of this edition of Pope, 
and Campbell's strictures upon it in his Specimens of the Poets, lasted for many 
years. 

Mr. Bowles published Ten Plain Parochial Sermons ; Paulus Parochialis, a series of 
sermons on Paul's Epistle to the Romans, suited to country congregations; The Life 
of Bishop Ken ; Little Villager's Verse-Book ; Cottage Hymns, and numerous other 
poems. The Little Villager's Verse-Book is highly praised. "One of the sweetest 
and best little publications in the English language." — Lit. Gazette. 

Alexander Balfouk, 1767-1829, a clerk in the publishing house of Mr. Blackwood, 
Edinburgh, was an author of some note. He wrote: Campbell, or the Scottish Pro- 
bationer; Contemplation and Other Poems ; The Foundling of Glenthorn; and High- 
land Mary. He contributed also to the Edinburgh Review. 

George Colman, Jr., 1752-1836, was, like his father of the same name, an educated 
professional dramatist. His plays were numerous, and had a marked success. Some 
of the most noted were The Iron Chest, John Bull, and Broad Grins. "Few books 
have caused more loud laughter than the Broad Grins of George Colman the j'ounger ; 
it is a happy iinion of mirth and the muse, and good jokes are related in so agreeable 
and facetious a manner that they can scarcely be forgotten." — Literary Chronicle. 

James Boaden, 1762-1839, was a dramatic writer, and was connected also with the 
drama by his intimacy with John Philip Kemble. Boaden wrote a number of Plays, 
seven of which are enumerated by "Watt ; he wrote also Biographies of Kemble, Mrs. 
Siddons, and Mrs. Jordan ; A Critical Notice of the Papers of Shakespeare published 
by Ireland; and An Inquiry into the Authenticity of the various Pictures of Shake- 
speare which have been published. 

John O'Keefe, 1717-1833, of Irish descent, was a voluminous playwright. Some of 
his plays are still performed, such as Tony Lumpkin in Town, "Wild Oats, Lo^'e in a 
Camp, etc. In 1826 he published his Recollections of My Life. After his death ap- 
peared a small volume of poems from his pen, under the name of O'Keefe's Legacy to 
his Daughters. 

Samuel J. Arnold, 1852, son of the celebrated musical composer, Samuel Ar- 
nold, Avas the author of a large number of dramatic pieces, running from 1794 to ISIO. 
The following are attributed to him: Auld Robin Gray, "Who Pays the Beckoning? 
Shipwreck, Irish Legacy, Veteran Tar, Foul Deeds will Rise, Prior Claim, Up all Night, 
Britain's Jubilee, Man and ^yife, The Maniac, Plots. 



THE NOVELISTS. 399 

II. THE NOVELISTS. 

Sir V/alter Scott. 

Sir Walter Scott, 1771-1832, after placing himself among 
the foremost writers of his day as a poet, outstripped both 
himself and them by his unbounded success as a novelist. 

Early Career Sir Walter was a descendant of the notorious Auld 

Wat, the freebooter of Scottish border story. In his eighteenth month 
he was rendered incurably lame by a severe attack of fever. His early 
childhood was passed in the country, under the care of his aunt, Miss 
Janet Scott. He afterwards studied at the High-School, and finally at 
the University of Edinburgh. He never became what is termed a good 
classical scholar, inasmuch as he never learned more than the rudi- 
ments of Greek, and speedily forgot even those, while his knowledge 
of Latin was always loose and superficial. Yet his power of imagina- 
tion enabled him to enjoy and appreciate more thoroughly what he 
read than is the case with many a first-rate scholar. 

After leaving the University, Scott became apprentice to his father, 
who was Clerk of the Signet, and, like many a poet before and after 
him, he was supposed to be devoting his time to the dry forms of con- 
veyancing and procedure. But his genius and his taste were too ima- 
ginative for such an occupation. He learned German and Italian, and 
continued his readings in his favorite English authors. 

Even as a very young boy, Scott was noted for his ability as a story- 
teller. In the High- School, and at the University, he was the idol of 
a select circle, who gathered around him in recess hours, to listen de- 
lighted to his improvisations. His poetical talents developed them- 
selves later. His imagination was fertile enough, but it was long be- 
fore he attained the power of rhyming and versification. 

First fuhlicntions. — Scott's first appearance as an author was in a poetical ca- 
pacity, as a translator of Burger's Lenore, and The Wild Huntsman, in 1796. These 
"V7ere soon followed by a like rendering of Goethe's G5tz von Berlichiugen. In 1803 
Border Minstrelsy was completed. 

Great Poems. — Passing over one or two minor works, and his contributions to 
the Edinburgh Review, we come to The Lay of the Last Minstrel, in 1805, his first 
really great work. This made its author at once famous. In 1808, appeared Mar- 
mion, and, in 1810, The Lady of the Lake. In five years, Scott had placed himself at 
the very head of his generation. 

Eiithusinsfic Popnlnritif — "We of the present day, with our tardy and care- 
fully discriminating appreciation, find it difficult to realize the unbounded enthusiasm 
with which the men and women of fifty years ago read, or rather devoured, Scott's 
Marmion and Lady of the Lake, and Byron's Childe Harold and Manfred. It is often 



400 SCOTT AND HIS COXTE M POR AKI ES. 

asserted, rashly, that the age of poetrj' has passed. Longfellow, Tennyson, Browning, 
not to name many others, are living witnesses to the contrary, both for themselves, 
and for their millions of readers. The truth is, simply, that we are more critical, 
more given to judgment and less to applause, than were our forefathers. 

Prosperous Itays. — Scotfs pecuniary profits from the sale of his poems were 
equal to his literary laurels. He purchased Abbotsford, near Melrose Abbey, and 
spent immense sums upon the estate, in the effort to convert it into a magnificent 
baronial mansion of the old style. In 1820 he was made a baronet. Living here 
in princely style, Scott made Abbotsford famous throughout the literary world, a 
synonym for lavish hospitality and fraternal reunion. To Abbotsford betook itself 
year after year all that was famous in art, literature, and science. Men of every 
country and profession were welcomed to its hospitable walls, and peer, prelate, and 
aspirant after fame came and went in ceaseless succession. 

Publication of the Novels. — Meanwhile the great wizard himself, the spell 
that kept together this gay concourse, was not resting on his laurels. In 1814 ap- 
peared, anonymously, Waverly, the first of the magnificent series of novels which 
goes by that name. The authorship was immediately ascribed to Scott, but persist- 
ently repudiated. In quick succession came Guy Maniiering, The Antiquary, Old 
Mortality, Rob Roj', The Heart of Midlothian, The Bride of Lammcrmoor, year by 
year one or more, until the secret could not longer be kept, and it was proclaimed to 
the world that Scotland's greatest poet was also the greatest novelist of his age. 

Jieversps. — 'Rwt the picture was soon to have its dark side. In 1826 Constable, 
and the Ballantynes, both large publishing firms, failed disastrously. Scott, who had 
been for some time a secret partner, wa.s involved in the ruin, and was liable for their 
joint debts, amounting to over a hundred thousand pounds. With heroic courage he 
gave up his estate at Abbotsford in part-payment, and devoted the remainder of his 
life to writing himself.'so to speak, out of debt. He succeeded, but the effort cost him 
his life. Not suffering himself to be interrupted even by the death of his beloved 
wife, in 1826, or by repeated attacks of ill health, he produced volume after volume — 
the conclusion of the Waverly series, from Woodstock on, the History of Napoleon, 
and The Tales of a Grandfather — until he sank into the grave, an overworn but not 
a broken-hearted man. A few months before his death, Scott travelled in Italy, vainly 
seeking to recover his strength and spirits. His funeral w;is unostentatious, but the 
procession was over a mile long, and all Scotland and England sent its mourners. 

No purely literary character was ever the recipient of greater spontaneous honor, 
in life and in death, than Sir Walter Scott. In the year 1871, the centennial anniver- 
sary of his birth was celebrated with an outburst of enthusiasm which carried the 
present generation back to the days of Marmion and Waverly. 

Scott's descendants have died out. with the exception of a single grand-daughter, 
Mary Morrice Hope. Thus his pet ambition — that of becoming the head of a long 
and illustrious line — has been foiled by Providence. His true offspring are not of his 
flesh and blood, but the creatures of his brain. Scott's wife was a Frenchwoman, the 
daughter of Jean Charpeutier, an Emigre of Lyons. His eldest daughter Sophia was 
married to Lockhart, the author of the well-known Memoirs of Sir Walter Scott. This 
biogi'aphy is, scarcely excepting Boswell's Life of Johnson, the most interesting in the 
language. 

SnnJc as an Author, — In estimating Scotfs genius, we should be careful to dis- 
tinguish between the poet and the novelist. As a poet, Scott is only in the second 
class, and not even first in that class. He is far surpassed in imagination by Tenny- 
son, Browning, and Longfellow ; in power and breadth of conception, by Byron. His 



THE NOVELISTS. 401 

Marmion and Lady of the Lake are not great creations. Yet their diction is so spirited, 
their fundamental conceptions are so pure aiid clieerful, tliey suggest such a glamour 
of forest and mountain, lake and heather, that they will ever remain among the most 
delightful gems of the great English treasure-house. On the other hand, as a novelist, 
and a delineator of character, he is imsurpas-ed. It is the fashion, among writers of 
a certain class, to speak of Scott as superseded by Thackeray and Dickens. In a 
measure this is true ; every writer, no matter how great, is crowded out more or less 
by his successors. Not even Shakespeare, Dante, and Goethe have been exceptions to 
the rule. But it may well be pondered, whether, years from now, when the final mus- 
ter-roll of English novelists is called, Scott's name will not head the list — whether 
Meg Merrilies, Jeannie Deans, Caleb Balderstone, Domine Sampson, Rebecca of York, 
Dirck Hiitterick, Dandie Dinmont, Flora Mac Ivor, Rob Roy, Dugald Dalgetty, will not 
shine, like the older windows of the cathedral at Cologne in the evening twilight, clear 
and unladed, while their younger and ambitious rivals, even Becky Sharpe, Major Pen- 
dennis, Ethel Newcome, Sam "Weller, Mrs. Gamp, and Mr. Micawber, will appear by 
their side slightly dimmed and tarnished. 

Scott's defects are palpable. He is diffuse, and not over-careful in the structure of 
his sentences. The plot is often unskilfully woven. The would-be heroes and heroines 
are not always interesting. But the subordinate characters display a wealth of humor, 
wit, fancy, shrewdness, and sentiment that make them unique. The tone of his works 
is healthy and life-giving throughout. Scott is nowhere so great as when he remains 
oil his native heath. His Scottish novels are pre-eminently his best. His Tory preju- 
dices and blindness of vision have passed away with the generation to which they 
were native, and there remain only his broad love of humanity, his cheery smile and 
quaint humor. To Scott belongs the honor of lifting the English novel from the 
dreary depths of the rakedom and sentimentality of the eighteenth century, and 
placing it upon the lasting foundations of good breeding, good morals, and good i 
from which no one henceforth can depart and be safe. 



Maria Edgeworth. 

Maria Edgeworth, 1767-1849, holds a high rank as a 
writer of novels and tales, and of works on education. 

Miss Edgeworth was the daughter of Eicliard Lovell Edgeworth. 
She was born in England, but resided nearly all her life in Ireland. 
Mr. Edgeworth was himself a man of letters, and an author of celeb- 
rity, particularly in works on education. Several of Maria's works 
were written in conjunction with her father. 

Among the conjoint works of father and daughter were: A Treatise on Practical 
Eilucation ; Early Lessons ; Essay on Irish Bulls. Miss Edgeworth also wrote The 
Parent's Assistant, as a Sequel to Early Lessons, and completed the Memoirs of her 
father, begun by himself. 

Her other works are chiefly Novels and Tales. They are descriptive of domestic and 
social life, and are so shaped and constructed as to teach the doctrines of morals and 
education with as mjich clearness as if they had been treatises on those subjects, and 
Avith a good deal more efficiency than most ti-eatises. For their truthfulness and viv- 
idness of description, and their skill in the delineation of character, they have 
received the highest encomiuiiLS from all classes of critics, and they have been perused 
34* 2A 



402 SCOTT a:n'd his contemporaries. 

with unabated delight by several generations of readers, both in England and 
America. Young and old alike delight in Miss Edgeworth's Tales. 

The best English edition of the Novels and Tales is m 18 vols. The following are 
the titles of some of the principal: Castle Rackrent; Belinda: Patronage; Ormond; 
Helen; Out of Debt, out of Danger; The Modern Griselda ; The Good French Gov- 
erness ; Murad the Unlucky, etc. 

Walter Scott was a great admirer of Miss Edgeworth's novels. The visit which she 
paid to him at Abbotsford is described by Lockhart as a scene of extraordinary inter- 
est. " Never did I see a brighter day at Abbotsford than that on which Miss Edge- 
worth first arrived there." — Lockhart. "If I could but hit Miss Edgeworth's wonder- 
ful power of vivifying all her persons, and making them live as beings in your mind, 
I should not be afraid." — Walter Scott. " Some one has described the novels of Miss 
Edgeworth as a sort of essence of common sense, and the definition is not inappropriate." 
— Walter Scott. 

"The writings of Miss Edgeworth exhibit so singular an union of sober sense and 
inexhaustible invention, — so minute a knowledge of all that distinguishes manners, 
or touches on happiness in every condition of human fortune, and so just an esti- 
mate both of the real sources of enjoyment and of the illusions by which they are 
often obstructed, — that it cannot be thought wonderful that we should separate her 
from the ordinary manufacturer of novels, and speak of her tales as works of more 
serious importance than most of the true history and solemn philosophy that come 
daily under our inspection." — Jeffrey, in Ed. Rev. 

" As a writer of tales and novels, she has a very marked peculiarity. It is that of 
venturing to dispense common sense to her readers, and to bring them within her pre- 
cincts of real life and natural feeling." — London Quarterly Rev. 

EiCHAED LovELL Edgeworth, 174-4-1817, was distinguished as a 
writer of some important and popular works on education, but still 
more as the father of Maria Edgeworth. 

He was born in Bath, England, but succeeded in 1782 to a family estate in Ireland, 
and continued to reside there afterwards. He was married four times. Maria was a 
daughter by the first marriage. He wrote in conjunction with his daughter: Practi- 
cal Education ; Easy Lessons ; Essay on Irish Bulls. His separate woi'ks are: Poetry 
Explained for the Use of Young People; Essays on Professional Education; Essay on 
the Construction of Roads and Carriages ; On the Telegraph ; Memoirs of himself 
(completed by his daughter). He contributed papers on mechanical subjects to the 
Philosophical Transactions. He was much distinguished for mechanical ingenuity. 

Miss Austen. 

Jajste Austen, 1775-1817, was the author of several novels of a high 
order of merit. 

Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park, and Emma, were pub- 
lished during her lifetime, but anonymously. Persuasion, and Northanger Abbey 
appeared after her death. Critics of the highest order, such as VThately in the Lon- 
don Quarterly, speak of Miss Austen's novels in terms of the strongest commendation. 
Sir Walter Scott says, her portraits of society are far superior to anything of a like 
nature produced by writers of the other sex. '■ I have read again, and for the third 



THE ^"OVELISTS. 403 

time, Miss Austen's very finely written novel of Pride and Prejudice. That young 
lady had a talent for describing the involvements, feelings, and characters of ordinary 
life, which is to me the most wonderful I have ever met with. The big bow-wow I 
can do myself like any one going; but the exquisite touch, which renders common- 
place things and characters interesting from the truth of the description and the sen- 
timent, is denied to me. What a pity so gifted a creature died so early ! " 

Lady Blessington. 

Margaret, Countess of Blessington, 1787-1849, was celebrated 
in her day for her literary abilities and her personal charms, and her 
attractions in both respects were greatly increased by her high social 
position. 

Lady Blessington was the daughter of an Irish gentleman, Edmund Power. She 
was married, first, at the age of fif+een, to Captain Parmer of the British army, and 
afterwards, at the age of thirty-one, to the Earl of Blessington. The Earl and 
Countess resided chiefly on the coiitineut. On his death, Lady Blessington, then at the 
age of forty-two, established herself in London, where for twenty years, from 1829 to 
1849, her house was the centre both of fashion and of letters, for a large and brilliant 
circle. She was celebrated equally for her beauty and her wit ; and she wrote with 
the same ease and grace with which she talked. Lord Byron was a great admirer 
of lier, and one of her most charming works is that in which she gives an account 
of her conversations with him. Her publications are numerous. 

Besides writing a good deal for the magazines, and for the annuals, which were 
then in high repute. Lady Blessington wrote many separate volumes, some of which 
were very popular. The following are the chief: Conversations with Lord Byron; 
The Magic-Lantern; Tour in the Netherlands; The Victims of Society; The Re- 
pealers; The Two Friends; The Governess; Confessions of an Elderly Gentleman; 
Confessions of an Elderly Lady ; The Idler in Italy ; The Idler in France; The Belles 
of a Season ; Memoirs of a Femme de Chambre; and a good many others. The novels 
of Lady Blessington "are peculiarly Romans de Soa'ete — the characters that move 
and breathe throughout them are the actual persons of the great world ; and the 
reflections with which they abound belong to the philosophy of one who has well 
examined the existing manners. Her portraiture of familiar scenes and of every-day 
incidents are matchless for truth and grace." — Edinhurgh Review. 

Miss Margaret A. Power, niece of Lady Blessington, wrote a Memoir of her aunt, 
and several novels : Evelyn Forrester, The Foresters, Nelly Carew, Sweethearts and 
Wives, etc., besides Virginia's Hand, a poem. 

Miss Mart Fereter, 1782-1855, a contemporary and friend of Sir Walter Scott, MTote 
three novels, all highly commended: The Marriage ; The Inheritance ; Destiny, or 
The Chief's Daughter. Miss Ferrier's novels were great favorites with Scott, and she 
herself was a frequent guest at Abbotsfoi'd. " Edgeworth, Ferrier, Austen, have all 
given portraits of real society far superior to anything man — vain man — has pro- 
duced of the like nature." — Sir Walter Scott. " To a warm heart, a lively fancy, 
and great powers of discrimination. Miss Ferrier has added a variety of knowledge, 
and a graphic art of describing all she sees and all she feels, which give her a dis- 
tinguished place among the novelists of the day." — Allan Cunningham. 



40-i SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES, 

Harriet and Sophia Lee. — Harriet Lee, 17o6-1851, and Sophia 
Lee, 1750-1824, sisters, were daughters of an actor of some note, and 
gained for themselves considerable reputation by their writings. 

They were engaged for m:iny years at Lath, in the management of a Yonng 
Ladies' Seminary. They wrote several woiks, which were well received. Tiioee of 
Harriet were: The Errors of Innocence, a Novel, 5 vols.; The Yonng Lady's Tale; 
The Clergyman's Tale; The New I'eerage, a Comedy ; and all except two of The Can- 
terbury Tales. Sojihia wrote The Ruin, a Tale of Other Times, 6 vols : The Life of a 
Lover, a Novel, 6 vols. ; Orraand, or the Debauchee, 3 vols. ; The Chapter of Aciidents, 
a Comedy ; Almeyda, Queen of Granada, a Tragedy ; The Assignation, a Comedy ; The 
Herniifs Tale, a Poem. Two or three of these plays were acted, and had consider- 
able success. The Canterbury Tales, already named, extended to five volumes, and 
were held in high rejiute. 

Gu.vcF. Kennedy, 1782-1824, was a native of Ayrshire, Scotland, but resided in 
Edinburgh. She was the author of a number of novels or tales, which have been A'ery 
popular, and have been held in high estimjttion by the critics : Decision ; Profession 
not Principle ; Father Clement; Dunallaii, or Know what you Judge; Jenny Allan, 
the Lame Girl; Anna Ross, the Orphan of ^Vaterloo; Philip Colville, a Covenanter's 
Story, etc. 

Lady Caroline Lamb. 1785-182S, daughter of the Earl of Besborough, and wife of 
Hon. William Lamb, afterwards Lord Melbourne, wrote several novels which gained 
some reputation : Glenarvon, supposed to be a portrait of Lady Byrou ; Graham Ham- 
ilton ; and Ada Reis. 

Miss Regina M\ria Roche, 1765-1845, a famous English novelist, is the rival of 
Mrs. Radcliffe. Miss Roche's most celebrated work is The Children of the Abbey, which 
has been widely read in England and the United States. Among the others are The 
Vicar of Lansdowne, Maid of the Hamlet, Monastery of St. Colombe, etc. 

Gait. 

John Gait, 1779-1839, wrote a very large number of 
works, and on a great variety of subjects. The works in 
which he was most successful were his novels. 

Gait was born at Greenock, in Scotland. He began to study the law, 
but abandoned it for a literary life. He was employed for some time 
as agent for an emigration company, to promote settlement in Canada, 
but quarrelling with the Government, and being dismissed by the com- 
pany, he thenceforward devoted himself entirely to authorship. 

Gait's works are numerous, and are open to criticism. The histories and biographies 
are mostly compilations, and liave the character of job work dcme for the booksellers. 
His novels, however, are thorouuhly original and fresh, and though not imiformly 
up to the highest mark, yet always contain much that is first-rate. The following is 
a list of his principal works : The Ayrshire Legatees; The Annals of the Parish ; The 
Wandering Jew ; The Entail ; The Provost ; The Spaewife; Rothelan ; The Last of the 



THE NOVELISTS, 405 

Lairds; Laurie Todd; Soutliennan ; The Omen; Gleftfell; The Bachelor's Wife; Rock- 
inghorse; The Stoleu Chihl; The Majolo ; Andrew of Padua; The Earthquake; Sir 
Andrew Wylie; The Steamboat; IliDgan Gilbaize ; EbenErksine; Gathering of the 
West ; The Member; Tlie Radical ; Bogel Corbet; Stanley Buxton ; New Bi-itish The- 
atre; Stories of the Study; Pictures from English, Scotch, and Irish History; Guide 
to the Canadas; Reflections on Political and Commercial Subjects; Voyages and Trav- 
els ; Lives of the Players ; Life of West ; Life of Byron ; Life of Wolsey ; Apotheosis 
of Sir Walter Scott ; Four Tragedies ; Poems ; Autobiography of John Gait. 

" There is a thorough quaintness of phrase and dialogue in Mr. Gait's last works, 
which places him apart from all other Scotch novelists ; much knowledge of life, 
variety of character, liveliness and humour are displayed in these novels, and render 
them justly popular. This humor and truth were recognized as admirable by Sir 
Walter Scott. The public will not soon forget his Ayrshire Legatees, his Annals of 
the Parish, nor the Entail ; which last we think one of his best novels. Mr. Gait's 
biographies, and many of his other later works, manufactured for the booksellers, are 
of a very different character." — Gentleman's Magazine. 

"According to our judgment, he has never written better than second-rate books ; 
though we have ever found in what we consider his worst pieces something of his 
best self, and something which carried us through the whole, at the same time leav- 
ing instruction fresh and precise upon our minds. And this is saying a great deal 
when we consider the catalogue of his writings. Indeed, his mind is such, that it can- 
not give out anything belonging to it, which partakes not of its original nature. 
Strong, and what is called rough good sense is ever there ; familiar but most expressive 
thoughts find similar illustrations most readily with him, which we presume could 
not have been improved by long study. He is, besides, strictly a moral as well as re- 
markably entertaining writer." — London Monthly Review. 

Beckford. 

William Beckford, 1760-1844, was a man of extraordinary 
genius, who but for his enormous wealth might have achieved the 
highest distinction as an author. 

Beckford was son of a Lord-Mayor of London, and inherited from his father, besides 
a large English estate, a fortune in the West Indies which yielded him upwards of 
£100,000 per annum. He was a man of a high order of genius, and he was educated 
with extreme care. If it had not been for his excessive wealth, he might have made 
himself one of the greatest ornaments of letters. As it was, he published several 
works of great literary merit. 

Beckford's first work, written at twent}', was Biographical Memoirs of Extraordi- 
nary I'ainters. It is a work criticizing with great severity certain English painters. His 
next and chief literary production was Vathek. This was an oriental romance, writ- 
ten in French, but translated into English by some other author. Byron speaks of 
it in terms of highest eulogy. It is said to be in such pui-e French that no one would 
suspect it to be written by other than a native Frenchman, and its orientalism is so 
complete that travellers in the East have some difficulty in believing that it is not a 
translation from some oriental original. With all its beauties, however, it is as auda- 
cious as anything in Byron in its licentiousness, and is diabolical in its contempt for 
mankind. Mr. Beckford published also a book of travels, called Italy, and another 
called Recollections of an Excursion to the Mountains of Alcobacca and Batalha, 
which contain passages of a high order of merit. 



406 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

" lie is a poet, and a great one, too, though we know not that he ever wrote a line 
of verse. His rapture amidst the sublime scenery of mountains and forests, in the 
Tyrol, especially, and in Spain, is that of a spirit cast originally in one of nature's 
finest moulds; and he fixes it in language which can scarcely be praised beyond its 
deserts — simple, massive, nervous, apparently little labored, yet reaching, in its 
effect, the very perfection of art." — London Quar. Review. 

Beckford spent vast sums of money in building Foiithill Abbey, on his estate in 
England, and in filling it with the rarest and most costly works of art. After aban- 
doning this fancy, he built another magnificent palace near Bath ; also, a mansion 
near Cintra, in Portugal, where he spent much of the latter part of his life. He wiis 
a man singularly gifted with genius and wealth, but utterly selfish and worldly, who 
had exhausted at twenty all the world had to offer, and lived in sullen grandeur to 
the age of eighty-four. 

Monk Lewis. 

Matthew Gregoey Lewis, 1775-1818, is often called " Monk " 
Lewis, after one of his celebrated works. 

Mr. Lewis studied at Oxford and also in Germanj', and resided during the last five 
years of his life in Jamaica. He is the author of a number of dramas and novels, 
which were at one time extremely popular, and exercised a great influence over the 
then rising generation of authors. The most celebrated are : The Monk, a romance so 
licentious in passages that the author was for a while in danger of i)rosecution ; The 
Castle Spectre, a drama; and Timour the Tartar; Rolla, and The Captive, dramas. After 
Lewis's death there appeared The Journal of a West India Proprietor, also bis Life and 
Correspondence. The Journal and the Correspondence are easy and entertaining iu 
style, and replete with information. 

As a writer of works of imagination, Lewis belongs to what is vulgarly known as 
the " blood-and-thunder " school. His works, abounding in scenes of horror, resemble 
those of Mrs. Radcliffe. Lewis was a man of decided imagination and poetic ability, 
as is shown by the ballads and songs scattered through his plays and novels. But he 
suffered his imagination to run riot, and although for a while he seemed to have 
created a new era in literature, his works are gradually falling into that neglect 
which is the lot of all crude and frantic effort. 

Charles Robert Maturix, 1782-1824, a native of Ireland, educated at Trinity Col- 
lege, Dublin, was the author of a number of dramas and novels, which enjoyed at 
one time a good share of popularity, but which have since fallen into neglect. 

The principal are Fatal Revenge, a Novel ; The Wild Irish Boy, a Novel ; Bertram, 
a Tragedy: Manuel, a Tragedy; Women, a Novel. Maturin's productions ai-e in the 
Mrs. Radclijf style, abounding in Liorrors, and his style, although vigorous, is extrav- 
agant and unequal. 

Michael Scott, 1789-1835, was a native of Scotland, educated at the University of 
Glasgow, and engaged for a number of years in the West India trade. Prom 1822 
until his death he resided in Scotland. Scott is the author of two celebrated serials 
that appeared in Blackwood's Magazine, and were afterwards reprinted. They are 
called Tom Cringle's Log, and The Cruise of the Midge. They attracted great atten- 
tion at the time of their appearance, and are still read and enjoyed by numerous 
readers. 



REVIEWEES AND POLITICAL WRITERS. 407 
III. REVIEWERS AND POLITICAL WRITERS. 

Gifford. 

William Gifford, 1756-1826, obtained distinction in vari- 
ous walks of authorship, but is chiefly known by his labors 
as editor of the London Quarterly Review. 

Gifford was born poor, and was left an orphan at twelve. He went 
to sea for a short time, and then was bound apprentice to a shoemaker. 
Through the liberality of a benevolent surgeon, Mr. Cookesley, Gifford 
was enabled to study the classics, and to attend for some time at Ox- 
ford. Spurred by a desire for literary life, he went to London. 

Publications. — Gilford's first publicaticn was The Baviad, a poetical 
satire, published in 1794, and directed against Mrs. Piozzi and other 
second-class writers and pretenders to literature. His next was the 
Maeviad, 1795, likewise a satire, and aimed at the dramatists of the 
day. Both poems were successful. In 1797, he became editor of the 
famous Anti-Jacobin. In 1802, he published a translation of Juvenal, 
which has been pronounced on good authority to be " the best poetical 
version of a classic in the English language." He performed a large 
amount of critical work in editing old English authors. He gave 
critical editions of Massinger, 4 vols., 8vo ; Ben Jonson, 9 vols., 8vo ; 
Ford, 2 vols., 8vo ; Shirley, 6 vols., 8vo. The editions of Ford and 
Shirley were unfinished at his death, and were completed by other 
hands. 

"Work as a Reviewer. — Gifford's crowning work, however, was his 
editorship of the London Quarterly Eeview, from 1809, the time of 
its inception, to 1824. Here he reigned supreme for a period of fif- 
teen years, and his reign was one of terror. He was a man of great 
acuteness of intellect, coarse and savage in disposition, lynx-eyed to 
detect blemishes, and relentless in exposing them, yet enjoying a large 
measure of consideration in the literary world on account of the power 
which he wielded by virtue of his editorial position, and which he 
used with incessant and remorseless activity. 

" As an editor of old authors, Mr. Gifford is entitled to considerable praise for the 
pains he has taken in revising the text, and for some improvement he has introduced 
into it. He had better have spared the Notes, in which, though he has detected the 
blunders of previous commentators, he has exposed his own ill temper and narrowness 
of feeling more. As a critic, he has throAvn no light on the character and spirit of his 
authors. He has shown no striking power of analysis, nor of original illustration, 
though he has chosen to exercise his pen on writers most congenial to his own turn 
of mind from their dry and caustic wit : Massiuger and Ben Jonson. What he will 



408 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

make of Marlowe, it is diflBcult to guess. He has none "of 'the fiery quality' of the 
poet." — Hazlitt. 

"He was a man of extensive knowledge; was well acquainted with classic and old 
English lore ; so learned, that he considered all other people ignorant; so wise, that 
he was seldom pleased with anything ; and, as he had not risen to much eminence in 
the world, he tliought no one else was worthy to rise. He almost rivalled Jeffrey in 
wit, and he surpassed him in scorching sarcasm and crucifying irony. Jeffrey wrote 
with a sort of levity which induced men to doubt if he were sincere in his strictures; 
Gilford wrote with an earnest fierceness which showed the delight which he took in 
his calling." — Allan Cunningham. 

" He was a man of rare attainments and many excellent qualities. His Juvenal is 
one of the best versions ever made of a classical author ; and his satire of the Baviad 
and Mseviad squabashed at once a set of coxcombs, who might have humbugged the 
world long enough. As a commentator he was capital, could he but have repressed 
his rancors against those wlio had preceded him in the task ; but a misconstruction or 
misinterpretation, nay, the misplacing of a comma, was in Giiford's eye a crime 
worthy of the most severe animadversion. The same fault of extreme severity w^ent 
through his ci'itical labors, and in general he flagellated with so little pity, that peo- 
ple lost their sense of the criminal's guilt in dislike of the savage pleasure which the 
executioner seemed to take in inflicting the punishment. This lack of temper pro- 
bably arose from indifi'erent health, for he was very valetudinary, and realized two 
verses, wherein he says Fortune assigned him 
One eye not over good, 
Two sides that to tbeir cost have stood 

A ten years' hectic cough, 
Aches, stitches, all the various ills 
That swell the devilish doctor's bills, 
And sweep poor mortals off. 

He was a little man, dumpled up together, and so ill-made as to seem almost de- 
formed, but with a singular expression of talent in his countenance." — Sir Walter 
Scott. 

"William Gifford, the editor of the Quarterly Review, seems to have united in him- 
self all the bad qualities of the criticism of his time. He was fierce, dogmatic, bigoted, 
libellous, and unsyrapathizing. Whatever may have been his talents, they were ex- 
quisitely unfitted for his position — his literary judgments being contemptible, where 
any sense of beauty was required, and principally distinguished for malice and word- 
picking. The bitter and snarling spirit with which he commented on excellence he 
could not appreciate ; the extreme narrowness and shallowness of his taste ; the 
labored blackguardism in which he was wont to indulge, under the impression tliat it 
was satire; his detestable habit of carrying his political hatreds into literary criti- 
cism ; his gross personal attacks on Hunt, Hazlitt, and others, \vho might happen to 
possess less illiberal principles than his own ; made him a dangerous and disagreeable 
adversai-y, and one of the worst critics of modern times. Tlirough his position as the 
editor of an influential journal, his enmity acquired an importance neither due to his 
talents nor his character." — Whipple. 

Maekintosli. 

Sir James Mackintosh, 1765-1832, obtained great and 
deserved celebrity as a writer on subjects connected with 
statesmanship and national polity. 



REVIEWERS AND POLITICAL WRITERS. 409 

Career, — He was a native of Scotland; was educated at Aberdeen, 
and afterwards studied medicine at Edinburgh ; abandoned the profes- 
sion for the law ; held the posts of recorder and admiralty judge under 
the East India Company ; returned to England and was elected to Par- 
liament ; afterwards occupied the chair of politics and history in the 
College at Haylebury. 

J'uhlicatiofis. — His first great work, Vindicije Gallicse, was published in 1791, in 
reply to Burke's Reflections, and liad the effect of staying for awhile the tide that was 
theu rising so high against France and the French Revolution. Subsequently, in 179y, 
he delivered a course of lectures On the Law of Nature and of Nations, which were tlie 
expression of his conversion to the opposite or conservative view. In 1803 he delivered 
an eloquent speech, afterwards translated into French, in defence of M. Peltier, who 
was tried for libel against Napoleon and acquitted. He contributed a nuuiljer of 
articles to the Edinburgh Review, the most famous of which are those On the Philo- 
sophical Genius of Bacon and Locke, On the Authorship of the Eikon Basilike, Tlie 
Partiti • of Poland, Madame de Stael's De I'Allemagne, On theRiglit of Parliamentary 
Suffrage. He also published a Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, and 
began The History of England for Lardner's Cabinet Encyciopfedia, but did not live 
to finish it beyond the middle of the third volume. This last work can scarcely be 
called a history; it is rather a collection of discourses on history. In 1834, after his 
death, there appeared a Review of the Causes of the Revolution in 1688, a fragment 
comprising all that Mackintosh had succeeded in realizing of his favorite project of 
writing a philosopliical history of England. 

Ji^stlniate of mm, — Mackintosh seems to have been greater as a man than as 
a writer. At least, no one of his works equals the wonderful reputation that he 
himself enjoyed among his contemporaries. All his large works are faulty in many 
respects. His Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, for instance, is 
glaringly deficient in its notices of the French and German schools. In the words of 
Allan Cunningham, " He seemed to want that scientific power of combination without 
which the brightest materials of history are but as a glittei-ing mass ; he was deficient 
in that patient but vigorous spirit which broods over scattered and unconnected 
things and brings them into order and beauty." In like manner. Judge Story expressed 
his impatience at Mackintosh's "want of decision and energy in carrying out his ideas 
and large designs." The explanation is found in the fascinations of London society 
and the brilliant r61e played in it by Sir James. In a circle of wits and writers, he 
was the brightest light. His good nature, his quickness, and his wonderful powers of 
memory invested him with a charm that fascinated everybody, and tempted him to 
lead a life of society which prevented him from achieving any results commensurate 
with his abilities. 

William IIazlitt, 1778-1830, wrote much on literary and politi- 
cal subjects, 

Hazlitt was educated at the Unitarian College, at Hackley. He commenced as an ar- 
tist, but soon al)andoned the brush for the pen. He contributed a number of articles 
to the pcriodicnl press and the Edinburgh Review, and wrote several lectures upon 
English Poetry, English Comic Writers, The Age of Elizabeth, etc., etc. After his 
death his literary remains were i)ublislied by his son, with a. sketcli of his life, and an 
essay on his genius, the latter by Buhver and Talfourd. The miscellaneous works of 



410 SCOTT AND HIS CONT EMPOK A R I ES . 

Ilazlitt were published in Philadelphia, 1848, in 5 vols", to which was added a sixth 
volume, a reprint of the Life of Jv'apoleon. 

In Ilazlitt's writings, merit is strangely jostled by demerit. lie has a wide range 
of sympathy and appreciation, but is subject to Ijliud prejudices. Especially is this 
defect manifest iu his treatment of (then) living authors. He seems incapable of ap- 
preciating a writer until he is dead. In the words of Professor Wilson, he reverses 
the proverb, and thinks a dead ass better than a living lion. 

"Hazlitt possessed, in a very eminent degree, what we are inclined to believe tb' 
most important requisite for true criticism — a great and natural relish for all tin 
])hases of intellectual life and action . . . but . . . there is scarcely a page of Hazlitt 
which does not betray the influfnce of strong prejudice, a love of panidoxical views, 
and a tendency to sacrifice the exact truth of a question to au effective turn of exjjres- 
sion." — TucLermaii. 

Geokge Caxnixg, 1770-1827, was a statesman and Parliamentary 
leader of great celebrity. 

In conjunction with some others, Canning started a satirical joui-nal, The Anti-Jac- 
obin, which was intended to ridicule and discountenance the principles of the French 
Revolution. The poetry of the Anti-Jacobin was remarkable for the keenness of its 
wit. One of the pieces contributed by Canning, The Knife-Grinder, a burlesque upon 
Southey, has been greatly admired. Mr. Canning had a strong propensity for literary 
pursuits, and would doubtless have made a great figure in the world of letters, had 
not bis talents been put in requisition in the more important science of governing a 
great empire. His Speeches have been published in 6 vols., 8vo. 

Thomas Erskine, 1750-1823, is believed to have been the greatest 
legal advocate that England has ever produced. ''As an advocate 
in the forum, I hold him to be without an equal in ancient or modern 
times." — Ch ief- Justice Campbell. 

Erskine's father not being able to give him the advantages of a University educa- 
tion, he entered the navy, and afterwards the army. After spending some years in 
this way, restless with the consciousness of powers for something better, he finally 
resolved upon the study of the law. The first case in which he was emijloyed was a 
political trial for a libel on one of the members of the Cabinet. " Then was exhibited 
the most remarkable scene ever witnessed in Westminster Hall. It was the debut of 
a barrister, wholly un practiced -in speaking, before a court crowded with the men of 
the greatest distinction, belonging to all parties in the state. And I must own that, 
all the circumstances considered, it was the most wonderful forensic effort of which 
we have any account in our annals." — Campbell. 

Erskine's success was instantaneous, and it never declined. He became Lord High- 
Chancellor, and was raised to the peerage as Baron Erskine. His Speeches, with Me- 
moir by Lord Brougham, have been published in 4 vols., Svo. He wrote Armata, a po- 
litical romance, 2 vols. ; also, A View of the Causes and Consequences of the Present 
War with France (1790), of which forty-eight editions were printed in a few months. 
"At the bar Erskine shone with peculiar lustre. There the resources of his mind 
were made apparent by instantaneous bursts of eloquence, combining logic, rhetor- 
ical skill, and legal pr-ecision, while he triumphed over the passions and prejudices of 
his hearers, and raoulded them to his ■vyill," — Campbell. 



KEVTEWERS AND POLITICAL WEITERS. 411 

Lord Hollaxd, Henry Kichard Vassall Fox, (Third) Lord Hol- 
land, 1773-1840, was a nephew of the celebrated orator, Charles James 
Fox. 

Lord Holland, educated at Oxford, was a warra supporter of his uncle in Parlia- 
ment, and a constant adherent to the Whig jmrty. His chief literary productions 
M'pre a life of Lope de Vega, and Three Comedies from the Spanish, which have been 
pronounced excellent. But he is still better known by his Foreign Eeminiscences 
and his Memoirs of the Whig Party, both edited by his son Henry Edward. These 
two works have been much read and reviewed, and are invaluable as a record of the 
growth of England and English politics during the first half of the present century. 

SiE. Samuel Eomilly, 1767-1818, the son of a London jeweller, 
entered the profession of the law, and attained to great distinction as a 
barrister and a statesman. 

Sir Samuel was regarded by his contemporaries as a most eloquent speaker, and a 
thoroughly honest man. His Speeches were collected and published in 1820. His 
Memoirs, partly written by himself, were edited by his sons in 1840. Among his 
writings are conspicuous the fragment on the Constitutional Power and Duty of 
Juries, his Observations on the Criminal Law of England, and his Edinburgh Re- 
view article on Codification. One of his most celebrated speeches was that on the 
slave-trade, deliver^^d in the House of Commons in 1806. He was a zealous advocate 
of the reformation ot the English criminal law, and of Catholic Emancipation. His 
success as a barrister was unequalled iu his day. 

Rt. Hon. John Sixclair, LL.D., 1754-1835, was born at Thurso Castle, Scotland. Ha 
was a member of Parliament for thirty years, from 17S0 to 1810, and took a promi- 
nent part in public affairs. In 1786 he was made a baronet, and in 1810 Privy Coun- 
cillor. He wrote much on subjects connected with political economy: History of the 
Public Revenue of the British Empire ; Statistical Account of Scotland; Origin of the 
Board of Agriculture ; Blight, Rust, and Mildew ; Hints on Longevity ; Observations 
on the Report of the Bullion Committee, etc. 

Cobbett. 

William Cobbett, 1762-1835, was an English political writer of 
great notoriety. He wrote under the name of Peter Porcupine, and 
exercised his vocation partly in the United States and partly in 
England. 

After a somewhat chequered career, Cobbett settled in Philadelphia in 1796, and 
started Peter Porcupine's Gazette, in which he entered with great bitterness and vio- 
lence into the political questions of the day. Dr. Rush and others prosecuted him for 
slander, and obtained a verdict against him of $5000. In ISOO Cobbett returned to 
England and began The Porcupine, which he continued for some time. Subsequently 
he established the Weekly Register, which he kept up for thirty years. He returned 
to the United States in 1817, but went back finally to England in 1819, taking with 
him the bones of the infidel, Tom Paine. 

The works of Peter Porcupine (that is the articles written by him in America) were 



412 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

published in London in 1801, in 12 vols., 8vo. "Cobbett in these volumes h.os left a 
picture of the politics and the leading politicians of America, which (with caution; 
must be studied by all who would understand the party questions with which they were 
discussed." — Chancellor Kent. 

Cobbett wrote also Emigrant's Guide; Poor Man's Friend: Cottage Economy; \ 
Year's Residence in America ; An English Grammar ; The Woodlands, a treatise on 
Planting; Parliamentary History of England; and Pamphlets almost ioDumer- 
able. 

Cobbett did not mistake in naming himself "Porcupine." He bristled all over. au'l 
against everybody in turns, and was always in hot water. lie was prosecuted and fined 
several times in England for slander, and once he was imprisoned. lie was as un- 
truthful as he was ill-natured. " His malevolence and lying are beyond anything." — 
Jeremy Bcntliam. 

Apart from his moral delinquencies, Cobbett was a writer of great merit. His style 
is almost universally commended. He was perfect maj-ter of that plain, homespun 
idiom which all understand, and he exjtressed himself with amazing clearness. " The 
general characteristics of his stjle were perspicuity unequalled and inimitable; a 
liomely, muscular vigor, a purity always simple, and a raciness often elegant." — Lou- 
cl/m Times. "The style of Cobbett is the perfection of the rough Saxon English, a 
model ofi)olitical writings for the people." He was especially remarkable for his 
rough common sense, and his powers of sarcasm. 



IV. PHILOSOPHICAL AND SCIENTIFIC WRITERS. 

Dugald Stewart. 

Dugald Stewart, 1753-1828, was the leading metaphysical 
-VN'riter in Great Britain during all the early part of the 
jDresent century. 

Dugald SteAvart was bom in Edinburgh, his father being at the time 
Professor of Mathematics in the University. He entered the High- 
School of Edinburgh at seven, and remained in it until twelve. Du- 
ring the last two years of this time he was under the well-known 
Alexander Adam. He attended the University from 1765 to 1770, 
that is, from the age of twelve to the age of sixteen. While there, he 
had the instructions of John Stevenson in Logic, and of Adam Fergu- 
son on Moral Philosoi^hy. In 1771 he went to Glasgow to study under 
Dr. Reid. While there he wrote his first work. An Essay on Dream- 
ing, which contained the germs of many of his subsequent specula- 
tions. He lived also in the same house with Archibald Alison, author 
of the Essay on Taste, with whom he contracted a lasting friend- 
ship. 

In 1772, being then eighteen years old, Stewart began assisting his 
father in the mstruction of the mathematical classes at Edinburgh, 
and continued in that department, jointly with his father, until 178-5. 



PHILOSOPHICAL AXD SCIENTIFIC. 413 

In 1778, during the temporary absence of Ferguson on a political 
mission to America, Stewart taught the Moral Philosophy class, in 
addition to his mathematical classes, and lectured on the subject with 
great applause. On the resignation of Ferguson, in 1785, Stewart was 
elected Professor of Moral Philosophy, and continued to fill the chair 
for twenty-five years. His lectures were greatly admired, and added 
much to the renown of the University. 

In 1806, Stewart received a sinecure ofBce from the Government, worth £300 a year. 
In 18U9, lijs health failing, Dr. Thomas Brown, at Stewart's request, was appointed, 
at first to lecture to the class, and afterwards to be a joint Professor, which arrauge- 
• ment continued until Brown's death in 1820. On the death of Brown, Stewart exerted 
himself in behalf of the aijpointment of Sir "VTilliam Hamilton, but was overruled in 
the matter, and the appointment was given to John Milson. Stewart's active duties 
in the Uuiversit3- ended in 1810. 

In his pliilosophy, Stewart was a disciple of Reid, and he followed up the reaction 
which Reid had begun, against the doctrines of Hume and Berkeley. Although not 
one of the most original or profound thinkers in his department, yet by the elegance 
of his style, the clearness of statement, iind the great compass of his writings, he did 
more than auj- man in his day to diffuse an interest in speculations connected wirh 
the human mind. 

His collected works have been edited by Sir ^Yi]liam Hamilton, in 11 vols., 8vo. 
His principal works are: The Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind; Out- 
lines of Moral Philosophj^ ; The Philosoph3' of the Active and Moral Powers : Lectures 
ou Political Economy; A General View of the Progress of Metaphysical, Ethical, and 
Political Philosophy, since the Revival of Letters ; Philosophical Essays; An Account 
of the Life and "Writings of Thomas Reid ; of "William Robertson the historian ; 
and of Adam Smith the political economist. 

Stewart, like our own Professor Silliman m another department, had extraordinary 
powers as a lecturer, amounting almost to fascination- "All the years I remained 
about Edinburgh I used, as often as I could, to steal into Mr. Stewart's class to hear a 
lecture, which was ahvays a high treat. I have heard Pitt and Fox deliver some of 
their most admired speeches, but I never heard anything nearly so eloquent as some 
of the lectures of Professor Stewart. The taste for the stiidies w'hich have proved my 
favorite pursuits, and which will be so to the end of my life, I owb to him." — James 
Mill. 

Thomas Brown. 

Thomas Bro"v\'x, M! D., 1778-1820, a distinguished Scotch meta- 
physician, was the colleague and successor of Dugald Stewart in the 
chair of Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. 

Dr. Brown's first publication, Observations on the Zoonomia of Erasmus Darwin, 
was written at the age of eighteen, and "exhibited astonishing prematurity of tal- 
ents." " The perhaps unmatched work of a boy of eighteen years of age." — Mack- 
intosh. 

The work which first g-ave him a world-wide celebrity was a treatise on Cause and 
Effect. The theory of causation which he introduced, though since generally aban- 
doned as untenable, was presented with such clearness of statement and such wonder- 
ful vigor and beauty of style, that it took the public by storm. Critics of all schools 
35* 



414 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

were loud in its praise. "This is a work of gr^at power. Before Dr. Brown wrote, 
we were confusedly all in the dark about causation. If ever there was a system which 
deserved the appellation of intelligible, compact, consistent, simple, this is the one. ' 
— JV. Am. Review. " His first tract on Causation appeared to me the finest model of 
discussion in Mental Philosophy since Berkeley and Hume." — ALicldntunh. 

Dr. Brown, in connection with his extraordinary acutenoss as a metiipliysician, had 
a rich and glowing imagination, as one can see at a glance in reading a page any- 
where in his works ; it is no wonder, then, to find him a frequenter of the haunts of 
the muses. His poetical works are numerous, though it is probable they would have 
passed into oblivion but for the splendor of his abilities in other respects. He 
wrote The Paradise of Coquettes ; The War Fiend ; The Wanderer in Norway, a Poem ; 
Agnes, a Poem ; Emily and other Poems. After Brown's death, his Lectures on the 
Philosophy of the Human Mind appeared. They constitute the leading monument 
of his fame. 

"It would be unjust to censure severely the declamatory parts of these Lectures ; 
they are excusable in the first warmth of composition. They might even be justifia- 
ble allurements in attracting young learners to abstract speculations. The pmse of 
Dr. Brown is brilliant to e.xcess. It is darkened by excessive brightness; it loses 
ease and liveliness by over-dress ; and. in the midst of its luxurious sweetness, we 
wish for the striking and homely illustrations of Tucker, and for the pithy and sin- 
ewy sense of Paley." — Mackintosh. 

Abererombie. 

John Abercrombie, M. D., 1781-1844, who was at his death at 
the head of his profession in Scotland as a physician, was equally emi- 
nent as a writer of medical works, and as a writer on metaphysics. 

Abercrombie's principal medical works are Researches on Diseases of the Spinal 
Cord, and Researches on the Diseases of the Intestinal Cord, etc. His works of the 
other class are The Philosophy of the Sloral Feelings, and the Intellectual Powers. 
The work last named has had an extended and general popularity. Though not pro- 
found, it is clear and easily understood ; it contains much curious and useful informa- 
tion, and it is particularly valuable on those points in which the mind is affected by 
the body. The author's medical experience and knowledge gave him special facilities 
for treating intelligently this class of subjects. A truly Christian spirit pervades all 
his writings. 

Jonathan Dtmond, 1796-1828, a member of the Society of Friends, wrote two works 
of great value: Inquiry into the Accordancy of War with the Principles of Chris- 
tianity ; Essays on the Principles of Morality, and on the Private and Political Rights 
and Obligations of Mankind. The former was one of the most effective weapons of 
the Peace Society. The latter has been republished in the United States, and has 
been made a text-book on Moral Science in many institutions of learning. 

Samuel Drew, 1765-1833, is chiefly and most favorably known by 
his work on The Immateriality and Immortality of the Soul. 

Drew was without any advantages of early education, but being c nverted from in- 
fidelity, he became greatly interested in religious topics and applied himself zealouslj' 
to study. He was editor of the Imperial Magazine, and wrote several works which 



PHILOSOPHICAL AND SCIEXTIFIC. 415 

were in high repute: The Immateriality and Immortality of the Human Soul ; Re- 
marks on Paine's Age of Reason; Identity and General Resurrection of the Human 
Eody ; Being and Attributes of God ; Life of Dr. Coke, etc. " His work on the Soul is 
truly wonderful; nothing like it was ever published." — Prof.Kidd. " His master- 
piece of metaphysical argument is contained in his Essay on the Soul, for which he 
has been styled the ' English Plato.' " — Lotid. Christ. liememhrancer. 



John Mason Good. 

John Mason Good, M. D., 1764-1827, though eminent in his pro- 
fession, and the author of several works on medicine of high authority, 
was almost equally distinguished in linguistic and theological pursuits. 

Good had no advantages of a University education, but was placed at fifteen as ap- 
prentice to a surgeon, and worked his way up in the profession by private study and 
dauntless perseverance. He was related on the mother's side to Dr. John Mason. 

Good's principal works, omitting those exclusively professional, are the following : 
The Book of Nature, 3 vols., 8vo ; Pantalogia, or an Encyclopaedia of Arts, Sciences, 
and General Literature, 12 vols, (written jointly by Dr. Good, Olinthus Gregorj', and 
Newton Bosworth) ; Maria, an Elegiac Ode ; Triumph of Britain, an Ode; The Nature 
of Things, translated from the Latin of Lucretius, with notes philosophical and ex- 
planatory, 2 vols., 4to; The. Song of Songs, with notes critical and explanatory; The 
Book of Job, translated literally, with notes critical and illustrative. These two 
works, on Job and Solomon's Song, displayed immense erudition, and gave the author 
a high rank as a biblical scholar. The work on Lucretius likewise showed him to be 
wonderfully at home in the deepest problems of classical scholarship. 

"These vast volumes are more like the work of a learned German professor than of 
an ungraduated Englishman. They display extensive erudition, considerable judg- 
ment, and some taste; yet, upon the whole, they are extremely heavy and uninterest- 
ing, and the leading emotion they excite in the reader is that of sympathy with the 
fatigue the author must have undergone in the compilation. The truth is, that Mr. 
Good, though very intelligent, is very indiscriminate in the selection of his informa- 
tion; and though, for the most part, sufficiently candid and judicious in his remarks, 
is at the same time intolerably dull and tedious. He has no vivacity ; no delicacy of 
taste or fancy; very little originality ; and a gift of extreme prolixity. His prose is 
better than his poetry; his reasonings are more to be trusted than his criticism ; and 
his statements and explanations are of more value than his argument." — Jeffrey. 

" No work of criticism in the language affords such a display of acquaintance with 
ancient and modern languages. Dr. Good is a firm believer in the antiquity of the 
book [Job], contends that Moses was the writer of it, and that it contains the great 
principles of the patriarchal faith. His translation is the most valuable work on Job 
in the English language, and must materially assist any individual in the interpreta- 
tion of that difficult book." — Ornie,. 



Olinthus Gregory, LL. D., 1774-1841, a mathematician of great 
eminence, was Professor of Mathematics in the Royal Military Acad- 
emy at Woolwich, yet had a taste for literary pursuits. ' 

Among Gregory's works of a popular character are : Lessons Astronomical and 
Philosophical, for the Amusement and Instruction of British Youth ; Letters to a 



416 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Friend on the Evidences, Doctrines, and Duties of the Christian Religion, published 
by the P-eligious Tract Society; Memoirs of Dr. John Mason Good. He edited also 
The Paiitalogia, or General Encycloptedia, in connection with John Mason Good and 
Bosworth. 

Jeremy Bentham. 

Jeremy Bentham, 1747-1832, attaiaed great celebrity as 
a writer on political reform. 

Mr. Bentham began authorship as early as 1776, by a sharp critique 
on Blackstone's view of the origin of Government. From that time 
on, for a period, of more than half a century, he continued to write 
and publish on almost every subject connected with legislative and 
political reform. His works were published, after his death, in 11 
vols., 8vo. 

A striking peculiarity of Bentham's works is that those written first 
were much better as to style than those written late in life. His early 
writings are marked by compactness, clearness, and general attractive- 
ness of style. As he advanced in life, he grew careless in this respect, 
and concerned himself only with the substance of what he had to say. 
His matter was always weighty, and he always provoked discussion. 

Most of the ameliorations in English law have sprang from the dis- 
cussions to which Bentham gave rise. He was indeed a bold, vigor- 
ous, and original thinker, but not a safe guide; and in his religious 
opinions was decidedly of an infidel character. The cardinal doctrines 
of his whole system were, that " utility is the test and measure of vir- 
tue;" and that ''the object of legislation is the greatest happiness of 
the greatest number." 

Bentham's chief works are the following : A Fragment on Gorernment, being the 
critique on Blackstone ; A Defence of Usury ; Principles of Morals and Legislation ; 
Panopticon, containing apian for utilizing the labor of convicts; The Rationale of 
Indirect Evidence; The Rationale of Punishment; The Rationale of Reward; The 
Book of Fallacies ; Church of Englandism and its Catechism examined. 

Of the Defence of Usury, 17S7, Sir James Maclintosh says, it is " perhaps the best speci- 
men [extantj of the exhaustive discussion of a moral or political question, leaving no 
olgection, however feeble, unanswered, and no difficulty, however small, unexplained ; 
remarkable, also, for the clearness and spirit of the style, for the full exposition which 
suits them to all intelligent readers, for the tender and skilful hand with which preju- 
dice is touched, and for the urbanity of his admirable apology for projectors." "A 
work unanswered and unanswerable; and not less admirably reasoned than happily 
expressed." — Edinburgh Review. 

Of the Book of Fallacies, twenty-seven years later, 1824, Sidney Smith says : " Whether 
it is necessary that there should be a middleman between the cultivator and the posses- 
sor, learned economists doubted ; but neither gods, nor men, nor booksellers can doubt 
the necessity of a middleman between Mr. Bentham and the public. Mr. Bentham is 
long; Mr. Bentham is occasionally involved and obscure; Mr. Bentham invents new 



PHILOSOPHICAL AXD SCIEXTIFIC. 417 

and alarming expressions ; Mr. Bentham lores division and subdivision — and he loves 
method itself, more than its consequences. Those only, therefore, who know his origi- 
nality, his knowledge, his vigor, and his boldness, will recur to the works themselves. 
The great mass of readers will not purchase improvement at so dear a rate, but will 
choose rather to become acquainted with Mr. Bentham through the Reviews — after 
that eminent philosopher has been washed, trimmed, shorn, and forced into cleanli- 
ness." 

Of the Church of Englandism, etc., 1818, the London Qv.arterhj Review says: "It is 
fortunate that this book (as we have said) is not attractive ; it is too obscure to be 
generally understood, and too ridiculous to be admired ; and however mischievous the 
intention, the tendency will be very innoxious. Of its worst part, the indecent levity 
with which all that is sacred is treated in it, we have not spoken. Those offences 
must be answered for at a higher tribunal ; but we would seriously recommend it to 
the author to consider whether the decline of life cannot be better spent than in cap- 
tiously cavilling at the doctrines of religion, and in profane ridicule of its most holy 
rites." 

Malthus. 

Thomas Egbert Malthus, 1766-1834, was the author of a large 
number of works on Political Economy. 

Malthus was a native of Surrey; he was educated at Cambridge, and took orders in 
the Church of England; from 1805 until his death, he was Professor of Modern History 
and Political Economy in Hailej'bury College. 

The principal works of Malthus are : An Essay on the Principle of Population, etc. ; 
An luquirj' into the Nature and Progress of Rent ; and Principles of Political Economy. 
His Essay on Population excited great attention when it first appeared; and the prin- 
ciples which it lays down have not ceased to engage the attention of philosophers ever 
since. He controverts the theory of Godwin and others upon the progress and per- 
fectibility of human nature, and endeavors to establish, as a fundamental principle, 
that population tends to increase in geometrical ratio, while the supply of food and 
otlier necessaries can be increased only in arithmetical. The corollarj- is, of course, 
that at some future day the supply of food will not sufficethe population. This theory 
has lately received fresh impulse by its relation to the so-called struggle for exist- 
ence underlying Darwin's Origin of Species. 

Rieardo. 

David Eicakdo, 1772-1823, is another prominent writer on Politi- 
cal Economy. 

Rieardo accumulated a large fortune in the stock-brokerage business, and was a 
Member of Parliament for the four years preceding his death. Ricardo"s Principles 
of Political Economy and Taxation, 1817, belongs to the same class with Adam Smitlrs 
Wealth of Nations, Malthus on Population, and Mill's Principles, leading works on 
the subject. Several of the principles laid down by Rieardo have been controverted 
or shown to be erroneous, but the work still retains its value as an able treatise. 

Besides the Principles, Rieardo was the author of several minor works and pam- 
phlets, prominent among which are the pamphlet on The High Price of Bullion a 
Proof of the Depreciation of Bank Notes, and a Reply to Bosanquet's Observations on 
the Report of the Bullion Committee. This Report, it will be remembered, was the 
celebrated one in which Francis Horner took so distinguished a part. Ricardo's Tract 

2B 



418 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

on Protection to Agriculture has been pronounced his best by McCulloch. His chief 
error, as a theorizer, seems to have been his view of rent, which he assumes to be the 
value of the difference between the best and the worst lands in cultivation. 

JoiiANN G.vsPAR Spurziieim, 1776-1832, acquired great notoriety 
by his writings on Phrenology. 

Spurzheim was a native of what is now Rhenish Prussia. Wliile studying medicine 
in Vienna, Spurzheim became acquainted with Gall, then professor. The two were 
thenceforth for many years intimately associated in investigating and lecturing upon 
the functions of the brain. In 1813 they parted company. From that time until his 
death in 1832, Spurzheim lived chiefly in England, lecturing and writing. lie also 
visited the United States. 

Spurzheini's claims to distinction as a physiologist are unmistakable. He is gene- 
rally regarded as the discoverer of the fibrous structure of the brain. Unfortunately, 
he was led away by phrenological speculiitions. Many of his w^orks were published in 
French. Of those published in English the best known are : The Physiological Sys- 
tem of Drs. Gall and Spurzheim, a treatise on Insanity, Phrenology, Anatomy of the 
Brain, etc. 

John Playfair, 1748-1819, was one of the scientific writers of the 
period. 

Plnyfair was a native of Scotland. He studied at St. Andrew's ; was at one time 
a minister in the Chur<h of Scotland, and afterwards Professor of Mathematics and 
Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. To young students, Playfair is 
principally known by his edition of Euclid. As a man of science he is known by nu- 
merous contributions to the transactions of the Edinburgh Ifoyal Society and to the 
Edinburgh Review. Among such contributions are the review of La Place's Mecan- 
ique Celeste, Remarks on the Astronomy of the Brahmins, and on Physical Astronomy 
(in the Encyclopajdia Britantiica). A celebrated dissertation, left unfinished, and pub- 
lished in the supplement tq the Encyclopaedia, is on a General View of the Progress 
of Mathematical and Physical Science since the Revival of Letters. Professor Playfair 
was a clear thinker and a clear writer, and in personal manners appears to have been 
extremely affable and popular. 

Sir Humphry Davy. 

Sir Humphry Davy, 1778-1829, is considered the greatest of Eng- 
lish chemists and discoverers. 

Davy was born in Comwall. lie began as apprentice to an apothecary, and at the age 
of forty-two was President of the Royal Society, and the first man in the world in his 
own department of research. His discoveries, besides advancing theoretical science, 
led directly to many practical results of the greatest importance in mechanics and the 
useful arts. 

His works, which have been iDublished in 9 vols., 8vo, are for the most part purely sci- 
entific. He occasionally, however, enlivened his leisure hours, or usefully occupied 
those in which his strength was not sufiicient for severe studies, with works of a lighter 
kind, sufiBcient to show that he might have made himself a great man in letters if he 
had not chosen rather to be supreme in science. " Had not Davy been the first chemist. 



PHILOSOPHICAL AND SCIENTIFIC. 419 

he probably would have been the first poet of his age." — Coleridye. Among his 
lighter works are: Consolations in Travel, or the Last Days of a Pliilosopher ; and 
Salmonia, or Fly Fishing, — the l.ast named being written when the author was unable 
through sickness to engage in his customary scieutific piu^suits. 

James Watt, 1736-1819, strictly speaking, cannot be classed among 
the prominent British authors. His printed works are few, and not 
very important. His name will rather be handed down to all future 
generations by reason of his works as an inventor. 

By his construction of the first practical steam-engine, and his many subsequent 
improvements, Watt did more to develop the industrial resources of his country than 
any one other man. He found England a comparatively weak and poor countrj^ and 
he died leaving it tlie richest and most influential in the world. It is more than prob- 
able that England, but for Watt's steam-engine, would not have been able to contend 
successfully single-handed against Napoleon. 

Watt was a man not merely of great ingenuitj' in the construction of machinery, but 
of sound understanding and extensive reading. By his industry he repaired the de- 
fects of his early education, and imbued himself thoroughly with the spiril; of philo- 
sophic inquiry. The only publication by him that is of general interest is his paper 
on the Constituent Parts of Water, published in the Philosophical Transactions, 1781. 
In this paper he took the first step beyond Dr. Priestley in determining the composi- 
tion of water. 

The life of Watt by Muirhead contains extracts from his correspondence wliich 
throw full light upon the growth of the invention of the steam-engine and the history 
of Watt's successive patents. This life presents the interesting record of a clear- 
headed, persevering man who wrought silently and slowly but surely the greatest 
revolution in modern industrial life. 

"Those who consider James Watt only as a great practical mechanic, form a very 
erroneous idea of his character. He was c^i^aZ/^ distinguished as a natural philoso- 
pher and a chemist, and his inventions demonstrate his profound knowledge of these 
sciences, and that peculiar characteristic, the union of them for practical applica- 
tion." — Sir Humphry Davy. 

Sir Charles Wilkins, 1740-1836, is associated in fame with Sir 
"William Jones, mentioned in a preceding chapter. These two eminent 
Englishmen were the main founders of the Oriental Society at Calcutta, 
and the first to introduce the claims of Sanscrit to the notice of Euro- 
pean scholars. 

Wilkins was a native of Somersetshire. In 1770 he emigrated to India, and was ap- 
pointed Writer in the' Bengal establishment. In 1786 hei-eturned to England, became 
Librarian of the East India Company, and Examiner for the Oriental Department at 
Hailej'bury and Addiscombe. 

Wilkins's works are numerous and valuable. The most important are his transla- 
tion of the Bhagarat Gita (the dialogues between Krishna and ArjunaX of the lIUo- 
padesa (Sanscrit Fables), the episode of Dushvanti and Sankuntala (from thf Maha- 
bliarata), a Grammar of Sanscrit, and the Radicals of the Sanscrit lan.'ruago. lie was 
also a liberal contributor to the famous Asiatic Iloaearches, and had begun a trausla- 



420 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

tion of tlie Institutes of Menu, but abandoned it on hearing that Sir William Jones 
had already undertaken the same. 

Since the days of Wilkins and Jones, Sanscrit studies haA-e made great progress, 
thanks to the labors of Bopp, l^assen, Weber, Benfey, Itolh, Whitney, and others; but 
all tliese and their successors will continue to regard Jones and Wilkins as the parents 
not only of Sanscrit, but of comparative philology. 

William Marsden, D. C. L., 1754-1836, the eminent oriental scholar, was a native of 
Dublin. He entered the service of the Ea.st India Company in 1771, and spent tlie 
eight following years in Sumatra. While there he applied himself with great dili- 
gence to the study of the Malay. On his return to England, be was elected a Fellow 
of the Royal Society, and was for some years Chief Secretary to the Board of Admi- 
ralty, lie published several important works, the fruits of his oriental studies: 
Th(^ History of the Island of Sumatra : Dictionary of the Malay Language; Gram- 
mar of the Malay Language ; Marco Polo's Travels in the Thirteenth Century, etc. 

Robert Mokrison, 1782-18.31. the first Protestant missionary to China, did signal 
service to letters as well as tb Christianity, by his life-long devotion to the mission- 
ary cause. Besides his translation of the Bible into Chinese, and his Dictionary and 
Grammar of the Chinese Language, he published Ilora- Sinicae, or Translations fnim 
the Popular Literature of the Chinese; Dialogues translated from the Chinese into 
English ; and A View of China for Philological Purposes. 



V. RELIGIOUS AND THEOLOGICAL WRITERS. 

Scott the Commentator. 

Thomas Scott, D. D., 1747-1821, was the author of a 
Commentary on the Bible which has been more read than 
any other like work in the English language. 

Dr. Scott, according to his own statements, entered the ministry with 
mere worldly views, and without having experienced a change of 
heart. After he had been preaching for some time, he was converted, 
and he became ever after an earnest advocate of what are known as 
evangelical views. 

His first work was The Force of Truth, in which he describes his own religious 
experience. During the course of his long ministry, he wrote many other books 
and pamphlets on religious and theological subjects. But the main work of his life 
was the preparation of his Commentary on the Bible, which first appeared in 1792. It 
was usually printed in 6 vols., 4to 

This great work was entirely his own composition, and was characterized by a 
sound sense and a general sobriety of judgment and clearness of statement which 
made it an ahnost universal favorite. No Commentary on the Scriptures probably 
lias ever been read half so much as Scott's. It is wanting in critical scholarship, 
and it skips the hard places, but it gives a clear, bold outline of the general scope 
of each passage. It is now practically superseded by works of a more critical 
character. 



EELIGIOUS AND THEOLOGICAL. 421 

Robert HaU. 

Robert Hall, 1764-1831, was, by unanimous consent, the 
greatest pulpit orator of his day, excepting possibly Dr. 
Chalmers. 

Kobert Hall was one of the few who have shown great precocity of 
talent and yet have risen to eminence in after life. '' Before he was 
nine years of age he had perused and reperused, with intense interest, 
Edwards on the Afiections and on the Will, and about the same time 
had read, with a like interest, Butler's Analogy." — Olinthus Gregory. 
He was born in Arnsby, Leicestershire, the son of a Baptist minister, 
and was educated, first at the Academy at Northampton under John 
Ryland, and afterwards at the Baptist College at Bristol. He was set 
apart as a preacher at the age of sixteen, and began actually to preach 
at that early age. 

He went afterwards to King's College, Aberdeen, to continue his studies for three 
years more, and while there he had the companionship of Mr., afterwards Sir James, 
Mackintosh. The two formed an intimate friendship, which continued through life. 
"They read together; they sat together, if possible, at lecture; they walked together. 
In their joint studies they read much of Xenophon and Herodotus, and more of 
Plato; and so well was all this known, exciting admiration in some, in' others envy, 
that it was not unusual, as they went along, for their class-fellows to point at them 
and say, 'There go Plato and Herodotus.' There was scarcely an important position 
in Berkeley's Minute Philosopher, in Butler's Analogy, or in Edwards on the Will, 
over which they had not debated with the utmost intensity." 

Mr Hall was settled as assistant pastor in the church at Broad- 
mead, Bristol, when nineteen years old, and remained there eight years. 
In 1791, at the age of twenty-seven, he took charge of the Baptist 
congregation at Cambridge, where he remained for fifteen years. In 
consequence of excessive mental application, he suffered an attack of 
insanity, which lasted from 1804 to 1806. On recovery, he was obliged 
to abstain from pulpit labor for two years. In 1808 he resumed pas- 
toral labor, in a comparatively retired church in Leicester, where he 
remained about eighteen years. In 1826 he returned to the scene 
of his first labors, at Bristol, and continued at that post until his 
death. 

The accounts given of the effects of his preaching partake of the 
marvellous. 

"From the commencement of his discourse an almost breathless silence prevailed, 
deeply impressive and solemnizing from its singular intenseness. Not a sound was 
heard but that of the preacher's voice — scarcely an eye but was fixed upon him — 
not a countenance that he did not watch and read, and interpret as he surveyed 
them again and again with his rapid, ever-excursive glance. As he advanced and 
36 



422 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

increased in animation, five or six of his auditors would be seen to rise and lean for- 
ward over the front of their pews, still keeping their eyes upon him. Some m-w or 
striking sentiment or expression would, in a few minutes, cause others to rise in 
like manner: shortly afterwards still m^ re, and so on, until, long before the clu ■ 
of the sermon, it often happened that a considerable portion of the congregati'/:i 
were seen standing, — every > eye directed to the preacher, yet now and then for :i 
moment glancing from one to the other, thus transmitting and reciprocating thou:;lit 
and feeling: Mr. Hall himself, though manifestly absorbed in his subject, conscious 
of the whole, received new animation from what he thus witnessed, reflecting it back 
upon those who were already alive to the inspiration, until all who were susceptibb^ 
of thought and emotion seemed wound up to the utmost Irmit of elevation on earth, — 
when he would close, and they reluctantly resumed their seats." — Olinthus Gregory. 

Dr. Hall was strongly moved by public affairs, and on several occa- 
sions he wrote and preached on the exciting topics of the day. The 
course of the French RevoUition called forth several controversial 
essays from his pen, and his sermon on the death of the Princess Char- 
lotte attracted universal attention by its commanding eloquence. 

His published works have been printed in 6 vols., 8vo. The principal subjects are 
the following : Apology for the Freedom of the Press; Modern Infidelity Consideri-d ; 
Reflections on "War: The Sentiments proper to the Present Crisis (1803); The Pie- 
newal of the Charter of tlio East India Company; Difference between Christian Bap- 
tism and the Baptism of John; A Vindication of free Communion; Sermons, 
Charges, etc. 

Hall belonged to that part of the Baptists who are in favor of free 
communion with other churches, and wrote much on the subject. 

" The bold diction, the majestic gait of the sentence, the vivid illustration, the re- 
buke which could scathe the offender, the burst of honest indignation at triumphant 
vice, the biting sarcasm, the fervid appeal to the heart, the sagacious development of 
principle, the broad field of moral vision, — all these distinguish the compositions of 
Robert Hall ; and we bear our must willing testimony to their worth." — London Qiiar- 
ierli/ Eevitw. 

Edward Irving. 

Edward Irving, 1792-1834, was a preacher of great power, and 
for a time he exerted a commanding influence ; but, in his later years, 
he suffered from mental aberration, believing himself divinely inspired, 
and endowed with the " gift of tongues." 

Irving was a native of Annan, Dumfries-shire, and a graduate of Edinbitrgh Univer- 
sity. He was at one time assistant to Dr. Chalmers. Afterwards, he removed to Lon- 
don, where he was settled over the congregation in Regent's Square. Becoming er- 
ratic and visionary in his opinions, he was obliged to quit the church, but by the lib- 
erality of friends he opened a place of worship of his own, and there continued to 
preach to all that came to hear him. Before these mental aberrations, which threw 
a cloud over his closing days, he was greatly admired for his eloquence, and wherever 
he preached drew crowds of admiring hearers. 



RELIGIOUS AND THEOLOGICAL. 423 

He published the following works : For the Oracles of God, Four Orations ; For 
Judgment to Come, an Argument in Nine Parts ; Babylon and Infidelity Foredoomed ; 
The Last Days; Homilies on the Sacraments; Expositions of the Book of Revela- 
tion, etc. 

Andrew Thomson, D. D., 1779-1831, was a Scotch divine, born in Dumfries-shire, and 
educated at the University of Edinburgh. He was one of the ministers in Edinburgh 
the last twenty-one years of his life. He was a man of commanding eloquence, and 
very resolute in attacking whatever he considered a public wrong. Among the sub- 
jects of his denunciation were the circulation of the Apocrypha by the British and 
Foreign Bible Society, lay patronage in the Church of Scotland, and British Colonial 
slavery. He was equally outspoken and persistent in advocating whatever he thought 
right. Among the objects of his advocacy were education, morality, and evangelical 
religion. "His was no ordinary championship; although the weapons of our spir- 
itual warfare are the same in every land, we all know that there was none who wielded 
them niore vigorously than he did, or who, with such an arm of might and voice of 
resistless energy, carried, as if by storm, the convictions of his people." — Chalmers. 

Dr. Thomson's publications were : Lectures on Select Portions of Scripture ; Ser- 
mons on Infidelity; Sermons on Hearing the Word ; The Doctrine of Universal Par- 
don; The Scripture History ; Sermons and Sacramental Exhortations. 

Bishop Middleton. 

Thomas Fanshawe Middleton, D. D., 1769-1822, Bishop of Cal- 
cutta, was a man of most exact scholarship, and a great ornament to 
the Established Church. 

Bishop Middleton's Sermons are considered models of style for masculine thought 
and energy of expression. His great work, however, was his Essay on the Greek Ar- 
ticle. His discussion of this subject was exhaustive, and his positions in regard to it 
have never been seriously assailed. The discussion was important as determining cer- 
tain critical passages in the New Testament which bear upon the question of the di- 
vinity of Christ. 

" This is a book of profound learning and most masterly criticism. The first part 
of it is occupied with an inquiry into the nature and uses of the Greek article, and 
the second contains the application of the views previously established to the inter- 
pretation of many passages in the New Testament. The extensive philological attain- 
ments of the learned writer are made most happily to bear in a number of difficult 
texts, and especially on some in which the doctrine of the divinity of Christ is con- 
tained." — Orme. 

Sir George Prettman Tomline, 1750-1827, an eminent Bishop of the English Church, 
was born at Bury St. Edmund's, and educated at Cambridge. He was private tutor to 
William Pitt. When Pitt became First Loi'd of the Treasury, Tomline was his secre- 
tary, and remained with him .until by the influence of the latter he became Bishop 
of Lincoln. Bishop Tomline published many works, but that by which he is chiefly 
known is Elements of Christian Theology, 2 vols., consisting of an introduction to 
the study of the Bible, and an exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles. 



421 SCOTT AND HIS CO XT E M POR A HI ES, 



Adam Clarke. 

Adam Clarke, LL. D., 17G2-1832, a Weslevan minister, obtained 
great celebrity as a commentator on the Bible. 

Dr. Clarke was a man of great learning and industry, and was particularly noted as 
an orientalist. His Commentary, on which he spent a large part of his life, is usually 
published in 6 vols., 8vo. It is in high repute among all denominations, though a 
special favorite of course with the Methodists. He wrote also : A Bibliographical 
Dictionary, 6 vols.; Bibliographical Miscellany, 2 vols.; The Succession of Sacred Lit- 
erature, 2 vols., and some other works. 

Hexry ]Maiityx, 1781-1812, shed great lustre upon the missionary 
enterprise, both by the brilliancy of his talents and his devoted piety. 

He was educated at Cambridge, and gave such evidences of scholarship and genius 
that official dignities of the highest kind would have been within his reach, had he 
remained at home. He embarked as a missionary to India in 1805, and labored chiefly 
in India and Pei-sia. His learning and his dialectic skill served him in good stead in 
arguing with the Moolahs of Persia, while his example has not been lost upon the 
young men of high promise in England and America. His chief publications are 
Journals and Letters ; Sermons preached in Calcutta and elsewhere ; Controversial 
Tracts on Christianity and Mohammedanism, etc. 

William Ward, 17G9-1822, was one of the noble band of early 
Baptist missionaries in India. 

He was born at Derby, in England, and went upon his mission in 1799. After an ab- 
sence of twenty years, he revisited England and various parts of Europe and America, 
and returned to his work in 1S21. He died of cholera at Senimpore, in 1822. Mr. 
Ward wrote An Account of the Writings, Religion, and Manners of the Hindoos, 4 
vols., 4to ; Farewell Lecture to Friends in Britain and America, on returning to Ben- 
gal in 1821. 

John Williams, 1796-1839, is known as " the Apostle of Poly- 
nesia," and " the Martyr of Erromango." 

He was born near London, and embarked as a missionary to Polynesia in 1816. 
After many years of service as a missionary, he was killed by the natives at Erro- 
mango in 1839. He visited England in 1S34-.38. Besides bonks in the Raratongan 
language, he wrote a work of great interest and value, A Narrative of Missionary En- 
terprises in the South Sea Islands, with remarks upon the natural history of the 
islands, the origin, languages, traditions, and usages of the inhabitants. 

Rammohun Rot, 1776-1833, was a learned Brahmin, who was converted to Chris- 
tianity, and embraced Unitarian or Arian views. He died in England, while ambas- 
sador of the King of Delhi. He was master of English, Sanscrit, and Bengalee, be- 
sides several other oriental languages, edited the Bengal Herald, and published nu- 
merous works, some of a literary, the most of a theological character. The best 
known of them is perhaps The Precepts of Jesus, published in English, Sanscrit, and 
Bengalee. 



BELIGIOUS AND THEOLOGICAL. 425 

Legh Richmond. 

Legh Richmond, 1772-1827, is known as tlie autlior of tlie Dairy- 
man's Daughter. 

Richmond was a native of Liverpool, and a graduate of Cambridge, 1794. He was a 
clergyman of the Church of England, of the evangelical school, and acquired great 
celebrity by the publication of three narrative tracts, The Dairyman's Daughter, The 
Negro Servant, and The Young Cottager, which have had an immense circulation. Of 
The Dairyman's Daughter alone, four million copies, in nineteen languages, had been 
sold as long ago as 1S4-9. Richmond wrote some other works, but the foregoing are 
the chief. 

William Magee, 1765-1831, a native of Ireland, was educated at Trinity College, 
Dublin, where he was afterwards a Professor and a Senior Fellow. He rose by degrees 
to be Archbishop of Dublin. He was a man of great learning and ability, and wrote 
several works. The one by which he is chiefly known is that on The Atonement, 
which is generally accepted as a masterly statenjent of the doctrine of the English 
Church on that subject. 

Bishop Jebb. 

John Jebb, D, D., 1775-1833, was a learned and scholarly prelate, 
and contributed largely to theological literature. 

Bishop Jebb was a native of Ireland, a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, and 
Bishop of Limerick. His principal works are the following: Sacred Literature, com- 
prising a review of the principles of composition laid down by Bishop Lowth ; Prac- 
tical Theology, 2 vols., 8vo; Poetical Instructions relating to the Church of England; 
Thirty Yeai's' Correspondence between Bishop Jebb and Alexander Knox; Piety 
without Asceticism, and several volumes of sermons. 

William Hales, D. D., 1778-1819, published a number of works on mathematics and 
theology; principally known by his New Analj'sis of Chronologj-, of which a second 
edition, revised, appeared in 1830. Said to be the most valuable woi'k on chronology 
ever published. His other works are: Prophecies respecting our Lord; The Holy 
Trinity ; Primitive British Church. 

George Hill, D.D., 1750-1819, a divine of the Kirk of Scotland, was a native of St. 
Andrew's, and Principal of St. Mary's College in that city. He published Theological 
Institutes; Lectures in Divinity, and several other theological works of a high cliai'- 
acter. His Lectures in Divinity are the best known, and are often quoted. 

John Evans, LL. D., 1767-1827, a Baptist clergyman of London, published many 
sermons and other theological works. Among these were An Attempt to Account for 
the Infidelity of the late Mr. Gibbon ; also. A Brief Sketch of the Different Denomi- 
nations into which the World is divided. Of this last-named work, fifteen editions, 
comprising 100,000 copies, were published during the authors life. 

Rev. Joseph Bensox, 1748-1821, was a Methodist preacher and writer of considerable 
note. His chief -works are the following : A Commentary on the Scilptures, embody- 
ing the views of Wesley and others, 5 vols., 4to ; A Defence of the Methodists; A Tin- 
dication of the Methodists ; An Apology for the Methodists ; A Vindication of Christ's 
36^ 



426 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Divinity : and several volumps of Sermons and Plans of Sermons. " A sonnd scholar, 
a powerful and able preacher, and a profound theologian." — Adam Clarke. 

Rev. George Burder, 1752-1832, an Independent preacher, was noted for his reli- 
gious writings of a popular character, and especially for his Village Sermons. No less 
than eight volumes of these are published, and they enjoyed a high degree of popu- 
larity. He wrote also quite a large number of Uymns, as a supplement to Watts. 

Joseph Gurnet Bevan, 175.3-1814, a member of the Society of Friends, a druggist by 
profession, wrote a Life of tlie Apostle Paul, a Life of Robert Barclay, and a Refutation 
of Misrepresentations of the Society of Friends. " Mr. Bevan is the ablest of the Quaker 
apologists. He writes with good sense, good temper, and good feeling, and has, for 
the most part, divested himself of that vague and unsatisfactory mysticism in which 
the Quaker advocates have embedded themselves."' — Lowndes. 

Belsham. 

Rev. TnoMAS Belsham, 1750-1829, wa.s an English Dis.=;enter, who 
embraced Unitarian opinions under the influence of Dr. Priestley, and 
wa.s for a long time one of the leading supporters of Unitarianism in 
England. 

Belsham's publications were numerous, and nearly all referred to this subject. 
Discourses, Doctrinal and Practical, 2 vols. ; Discourse on the Person of Christ ; 
Review of American Unitarianism ; Review of Wilberforce's Treatise ; Letters in Vin- 
dication of Unitarians, etc. Mr. Belsham took a leading part also in the Improved 
Version of the Scriptures, undertaken by the English Unitarians about the beginning 
of the present century. 

William Belsham, 1753-1827, brother of Thomas Belsham, was 
the author of several treatises on philosophical and moral subjects, and 
a voluminous writer of historical memoirs. 

His works are : Essays, Philosophical, Historical, and Literary; Observations on the 
Test Laws; Historic Memoirs on the French Revolution; History of Great Britain 
from the Revolution in 16S8 to the Treaty of Amiens, 1802, 12 vols.. 8vo. As an his- 
torian, Belsliam has a respectable standing, though in the portion of history connected 
with his own times he is charged with partisanship. 

JoHX MiLXER, D. D., 1752-1826, was an ecclesiastic of the Church 
of Eome, of high standmg for learning and scholarship. 

3Iilner's writings were numerous. The chief were the following: The History, 
Civil and Ecclesiastical, and A Survey of the Antiquities, of Winchester, 2 vols., 
4to; and a polemical work. The End of Controversy, which has passed through many 
editions, English and American, and is very celebrated in theological literature. 

Charles Butler, 1750-1832, was one of the principal Catholic 
writers of his day. 



MISCELLANEOUS WEITERS. 427 

Mr. Butler was a lawyer by profession, and a nephew of Alban Butler. In addition 
to his labors and writings of a legal character, he wrote a good deal on religious 
subjects, and though, like his uncle, of a courteous and charitable disposition, 
yet, from the nature of some of his topics, he became involved in a good deal of con- 
troversy. 

Among his works are : A Succinct History of the Geographical and Political Revo- 
lutions of the German Empire : A Continuation of Rev. Alban Butler's Lives of the 
Saints; Historical Memoirs of the English, Irish, and Scottish Catholics since the 
Reformation ; Life of Erasmus ; Life and Writings of Bishop Bossuet ; The Book of the 
Roman Catholic Church, etc. 

William McGavin, 1773-1832, was a native of Ayrshire, Scotland, and was engaged 
in commercial business. He engaged actively in the controversy against the Catho- 
lics. His chief work was a series of papers, called The Protestant, and extending to 
four large volumes. The work is marked by vigor, and has had a large sale ; but it 
is partisan in character, and is strongly objected to by Catholics for its alleged un- 
fairness and inaccuracy in regard to facts. 



VI. MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS-. 

Mrs. Barbauld. 

Mrs. Anna Letitia Barbauld, 1743-1825, though not 
gifted with genius of so high an order as Joanna Baillie, 
was yet a woman of noble mould, who deserves well of her 
kind both for what she did and for what she was. Her 
writings, which are numerous, are partly educational and 
partly belong to what is called polite literature. 

Mrs. Barbauld was the daughter of the Kev. John Aikin and the 
sister of Dr. John Aikin. Her father, who was a Dissenting minister 
and who kept a seminary for the education of boys, gave her the same 
lessons with his other pupils, and thus she was thoroughly instructed 
in Greek and Latin classics. At the age of thirty she published a 
volume of poems, of which four editions were sold in one year. In 
the same year, she and her brother published jointly a volume of 
Miscellaneous Pieces in Prose, 

She was married at the age of thirty-one to the Kev. Kochomant 
Barbauld, a Dissenting minister of French descent. She and her hus- 
band opened a boarding-school for boys, the success of which was due 
mainly to her exertions. Several young boys were taken under her 
entire charge. Among these lads were two who afterwards became 
distinguished, Sir William Gell and Lord Chief-Justice Denman. 

WorTcff. — It was for these young pupils that Mrs. Barbauld composed her two best 
works. Early Lessons for Children, and Hymns in Prose. Somewhat late in life she 



428 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

wrote several political pamphlets, exposing the course of the Whigs. She assiste.i her 
brother, Dr. Aikin, in the composition of Evenings at Home, though tlie part which 
she contributed to the work was but small. Among her other works, she edited the 
British Novelists, in 50 vols., and Selections from the Spectator, Tatler. Guardian, and 
Freeholder. She wrote a Life of Richardson ; a poem of a political character, Eiglit<'cn 
Hundred and Eleven; A Poetical Epitaph to Mr. Wilberforce; and a great variety of 
critical and educational Essays. 

Mrs. Barbauld lived to the n^e of eighty-two, and lier closing vears, 
like those of many other women eminent in literature, were peaceful 
and serene. " Her works show great power of mind, an ardent love 
of civil and religious liberty, and that genuine and practical pietv 
which ever distinguished her character." — Mrs. Hale, in Woman's 
Record. 

The lines given below were written by Mrs. Barbauld in her extreme old age. They 
have a curious history. Crabb Robinson .says that on one occasion he repeated the 
line.s to Wordsworth, while on a visit to the poet. Wordsworth, who was walking up 
und down in his sitting-room, asked to have them repeated again and again, until he 
had learned them by heart. Then, pausing in his walk, and muttering to himself, he 
said, " I am not in the habit of grudging people their good things, but I wish I had 
written those lines.'" 

" Life ! I know not what thou art, 

But know that thou and I must part; 

And when, or how, or where we met, 

I own to me 's a secret yet. 

Life! we've been long together, 

Through pleasant and through cloudy weather; 

'Tis hard to part when friends are dear — 

Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear; 

Then, steal awaj-, give little warning. 

Choose thine own time: 

Say not Good-Night, — but in some brighter clime 

Bid me Good-Morning." 

Dr. Aikin. 

John Atkin", M. D., 1747-1822, an industrious and useful writer, 
was for fifty years prominently before the public as an author and a 
compiler, but without achieving any lasting renown. 

Dr. Aikin's earliest publications were in the line of his profession, and he prepared 
a volume of Medical Biography, which was favorably received. In conjuuction witli 
his sister, Mrs. Barbauld, he wrote Evenings at Home, a series of essays and tales for 
children. These were completed in 1795, in 6 vols., and were very popular. They 
were translated into almost every language of Europe, and led the way to numerous 
works of a similar nature by other hands. Other early works by Dr. Aikin are 
Essays on Song- Writing and Letters from a Father to a Son. He edited the Monthly 
Magazine for ten years (1796-1807), the Athenseum for two years (1808, '9), Dodslej-'s 
Annual Register five years (1811-1815). He was engaged for twenty years (1796-1815) 



MISCELLANEOUS WKITERS. 429 

on a General Biography, in 10 vols., 4to, in which, however, he had the assistance of 
several fellow-laborers, Southey among others. His latest publication was an edition 
of the Select Works of the British Poets, with copious notes, biographical and criti- 
cal. The work is familiarly known as Aikin's British Poets, and has enjoyed an ex- 
tensive popularity. 

Lucy Aikin, daughter of John Aikin, M. D., has written several historical works, 
namely : Memoirs of the Court of James I., of Queen Elizabeth, and of Charles I., 
each in 2 vols., 8vo, and a Life of Addison, also in 2 vols., 8vo. The Edinburgh Re- 
view speaks of the publication first named as "An admirable historical work, nearly 
as entertaining as a novel, and far more instructive than most histories." She wrote 
also a memoir of her father, Dr. John Aikin. 



Helen Maria Williams, 1762-1827, was a voluminous writer on 
French affairs. 

Miss Williams was born in London, but lived most of her time in Paris. She was 
a warm advocate of the Ereiich Revolution ; and in consequence of her espousing the 
cause of the Girondists, she was imprisoned by the opposite party, but was released 
on the downfall of Robespierre. She died in Paris. 

Miss WUliams wrote Letters from France, several volumes, published at different 
times ; A Sketch of the Politics of France, and of Scenes in the Prisons of France ; 
Sketches of the State of Manners and Opinions in the French Republic towards the 
Close of the 18th Century ; Narrative of Events in France from the Landing of Na- 
poleon in 1815 till the Restoration of Louis the Eighteenth; Events in France since 
the year 1815. Miss Williams wrote also two novels, Edwin and Elfrida, and Julia; 
and several volumes of Poems ; and translated several important works from the 
French, Humboldt's Travels in Central and South America, 7 a^oIs., 8vo ; Humboldt's 
American Researches; 2 vols., 8vo, etc. She is the author of some beautiful Hymns, 
among them that beginning, " Whilst Thee I seek, protecting Power." 

Egbert Anderson, M. D., 1751-1830, a graduate of the Univer- 
sity of Edinburgh, though not the author of many original works of 
note, was occupied with literary pursuits for forty years in the city 
of Edinburgh, where he occupied a position similar to that of Dr. 
Aikin in London. 

Dr. Anderson's chief merit is that of a judicious biographer, editor, and annotator 
of the British poets. His principal publications are : The Works of the British Po?ts, 
with Prefaces Biographical and Critical, 13 vols. ; Life of Dr. Smollett ; Life of Samuel 
Johnson, with critical observations on his works. 

Alexander Chalmers, 1759-1834, was a nntive of Scotland, but a resident of Lon- 
don. He had a good classical and medical education. His first literary employment 
was as a contributor to the leading newspapers of London. Later he gave his 
attention mainly to editing standard works, with critical collations and notices. He 
edited The British Essayists, 45 vols. ; The English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper, 
21 vols. ; Shakespeare, 8 vols. ; also Fielding, Bolingbroke, Gibbon, Pope, Johnson, 
etc., etc. He wrote A Continuation of the History of England ; A Sketch of the Isle 
of Wight ; A History of the College, Halls, and Public Buildings of the University of 



430 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPOR AEIES. 

Oxford, with Lives of the Founders. His greatest and best work was A General Bio- 
graphical Dictionary, 32 vols., 8vo. '' Mr. Chalmers was most indefatigable and la- 
borious in his studies and devotion to literature. No man ever edited so many works 
for the booksellers of London; and his attention to accuracy of collation, his depth 
of research as to facts, and his discrimination as to the character of the authors, 
under his review, cannot be too highly praised." — Gentleman's Magazine. 



Sir Egerton Brydges. 

Sir Samuel Egerton Brydges, 1762-1837, a gentleman of wealth 
and of good family, was a most prolific writer. 

He induced his brother to lay claim to the Barony of Chandos, but the House of 
Peers decided adversely to the claim. The disappointment of Sir Egerton was great, 
and his soreness on this account appears in many of his writings. He spent much of 
his time on the continent, and many of his works were printed abroad, at Geneva, 
Florence, etc. Many also were printed at his own private press, near Canterbury. 
Of these privately printed works, the editions were usually only 100 copies, some- 
times only 30 cojjies. 

His works are exceedingly numerous. The following are only a few : Censura Lit- 
eraria, containing Titles and Opinions of Old English Books, 10 vols. ; Res Literariae, 
3 vols.; Sonnets and Poems : Arthur Fitz-Albini, a Novel ; Le Forester, a Novel ; Con- 
ingsby; The Hall of Hallingsey; Recollections of Foi-eign Travel; Lake of Geneva; 
Letters from the Continent; Letters on Lord Byron; The Autobiography, Times, 
Opinions, and Contemporaries of Sir Egerton Brydges. 

"The author before us is as intimately persuaded of the reality of his powers, of the 
solidity of his reputation, as if the loud huzzas of the literary world were borne to his 
retreat. The amabilis insania (the delusion is too proud, too strong for ordinary van- 
ity), cheats, soothes, flatters, to the verge -of the abyss. All that criticism could prove, 
all that neglect — servant of all critics — could teach, fall vain and unheeded on the 
soul of a nature of this mould." — Edinburgh Review. 

Nathan Drake, M. D., 1766-1836, made large and valuable con- 
tributions to literary history. 

Dr. Drake was a native of England, and a graduate of the University of Dublin. 
While practising his profession for forty-five years, he was at the same time a diligent 
student of literature. 

-Dr. Drake's works are numerous. The following are the chief: Shakespeare and his 
Times. 2 vols., 4to; Literary Hours, 3 vols., 8vo ; TTinterNights, 2 vols., 8vo; Evenings in 
Autumn, 2 vols., 8vo ; Mornings in Spring, 2 vols., 8vo ; Noontide Leisure, 2 vols., Svo ; 
The Speculator ; Essays illustrative of the Tatler, Spectator, Guardian, Rambler, Ad- 
venturer, Idler, etc., 5 vols., 8vo. 

" No work has hitherto appeared, and we may venture almost to pronounce that 
none can in future be produced, in which so much of agreeable and well-digested in- 
formation on this subject [Shakespeare and his Times] will be found as in this mas- 
terly production of Dr. Drake." — Archdeacon Nares, in the Gent. Mag. 

"In 1803, I got a bright new book, fresh from the press in those days, on which I 
still reflect with pleasure ; namely, Drake's Literary Hours. It became my favorite 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 431 

companion for years afterwards, and it was this work, more than all others, which at 
that early age fixed my affections on literary pursuits." — Gillies's Literary Veteran. 

" We have been surprised and mortified to notice the shameful ignorance prevailing 
in America respecting the publications of this eminent writer." — AlUbone. 



Charles Lamb. 

Charles Lamb, 1775-1834, excelled all the men of his day in 
the style of writing which he chiefly cultivated. The Essays of Elia, 
by which he is best known, are marked by a certain delicate and quiet 
humor, which will always ensure him a chosen band of devoted ad- 
mirers. 

Lamb was born in London, and educated at Christ's Hospital. He was clerk in the 
East India Company's House for a great number of years, and retired on a pension in 
1825. In 1796, his sister, Mary Lamb, in a fit of insanity, killed her mother. Mary 
was intrusted after this for safe keeping to her younger brother Charles, who thence- 
forth devoted to her his supreme care and attention, even abandoning for this pur- 
pose his prospects of marriage. This harrowing event and its consequent burdens 
have given to Charles Lamb"s writings that peculiar tinge of subdued melancholy 
which underlies all their wit and joviality. 

WorJes. — The brother and sister published several joint works, such as Tales from 
Shakespeare, The Adventures of Ulysses, and Poetry for Children. Charles Lamb 
first appeared as an acknowledged author in 1797, in a small volume of poems, the 
joint work of himself, Coleridge, and Charles Lloyd. This was followed by Rosamund 
Gray, a touching story; John Woodvil, a tragedy in imitation of the style of the 

Elizabethan dramatists ; Mr. H , a Farce; Specimens of English Dramatic Poets. 

In 1823 appeared the work by which Lamb is best known, the Essays of Elia, and, 
in 1833, The Last Essays of Elia. In 1830 he published Album Verses and Other 
Poems. 

HJstimate of Ilhn. — As a poet. Lamb cannot be placed very high in the scale. 
In the words of Moir, " he was a true poet, but not a great one." His verses abound 
in quaint feeling and suggestive passages, but they are deficient in poetic fire. Charles 
Lamb will ever be known as a prosaist — a writer of easy sketches. Not that he is a 
popular writer, in the strict sense of that word. His play of thought is too subtle, 
his sug^gestions-call for too much culture and information on the reader's part. Lamb 
will always be the delight of a select few in each generation, who have themselves the 
leisure and the freedom from worry which pervade his writings. 

Conversational Po^vers. — It must be added, in conclusion, that the best part 
of Lamb is not embodied in his writings. His genius as a conversationist, his sly 
puns, far-reaching and deep-reaching sallies, his easy, quaint humor, his unexpected 
up-wellings of emotion, far outshone, according to the testimony of his contempora- 
ries, all that he ever committed to paper. Many of his famous sayings have passed 
into the life of the people, but many more, unrecorded, are now lost beyond recovery. 

Amos S. Cottle, 1800, a graduate of Cambridge, was a student of the Northern 

literature. He published Icelandic Poetry, or The Edda of Sheiuend, translated into 
English Verse. — Joseph Cottle, 1770-1853, brother of Amos, and a bookseller of 
Bristol, was a studious man, and was the author of several volumes: Malvern Hills; 



432 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Alfrff] ; Tho Fall of Cambria; Reminiscences of Coleridge and Pouthev. Cottio ia 
chiefly known by bis generosity to the young poets. Coleridge and Southey, to both of 
whom he lent a helping hand at the outset of their career; and by the ungf-neroua 
fling which on that account he and his bi-other received from Byron in the English 
Barda and Scotch Reviewers: 

" Beotiiin Cottle, rich Bristowa's boast, 

Imports old stories from the Cambrian coast, 

And sends hia goods to market — all alive I 

Lines forty thousand, cantos twenty-five." 

" Oh I Amos Cottle ! Phoebus ! — what a name 
To fill the speaking trump of future fame! 
Oh 1 Amos Cottle! for a moment think 
What meagre profits spread from pen and ink I " 

Roscoe. \ 

WiLLiAiM Iio.«coE, IT'jO-lS;]!, is well known as a writer on Italian 
history and literature. 

Roscoe was a native of Liverpool and son of a gardener. 'Whon sixteen years old, he 
was articled to an attorney. Although not neglecting his profession, he devoted much 
of his time to reading, and learned the principal niotlern languages. In 1774 he was 
admitted to practise as an attorney, and remained in the profession for twenty-tw ■ 
years, when he retired, having accumulated means enough to live in elegant leisur- 
But he was soon drawn back into active life, became partner in a large banking-house 
in Liverpool, and was returned to Parliament, lie exerted himself actively in behalf 
of Catholic Emanciiiation and the abolition of the slave-trade, and in many philan- 
thropic measures. In 1816 the house of which he was a partner failed, and he was 
obliged to sell his valuable library and collections. 

Mr. Roscoe was the author of a considerable number of pamphlets, addresses, etc., 
and also of some poems and songs which have gained popularity, such as Unfold, 
Father Time, Thy Long Records Unfold, O'er the A'ine-Covered. Hills and Gay Regions 
of France, etc. But the works upon which his reputation rests are his Life of Lorenzo 
de Medici, and his Life of Leo X. They were for a long time the standard works on 
tlie subject of which they treat. The style is in the main pleasing, and the author's 
knowledge is extensive. Unfortunately, however, Roscoe is not critical and accurate 
enough in his use of authorities, and has even consciously veiled some of the worst 
features of that age in Italy. For ranch of the ground which Roscoe covers he has 
been superseded by later writers, especially by Trollope in his Eistory of the Floren- 
tine Republic. 

Thomas Ecscoe, 1791 , son of William Eoscoe the historian, 

is favorably known as a translator, author, and editor. 

As a translator, Mr. Roscoe has given to the English public renderings of Si^mondi's 
Literature of Southern Europe, CeuvL-nuto Cellini's Autubiography, and a library of 
eleven volumes of Italian, German, and Frencli novelists. He has edited the Novelists' 
Library, containing sixteen volumes from Fielding, Smollett. Sterne, etc., with bio- 
graphical notes. His original works are also numerous, and cover a great variety of 
subjects, from the Life and Writings of Cervantes, or a Picturesque Tour in Belgium, 
to the History of the London and North-Western Railway. 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 433 

George Chalmers, 1742-1825, was a voluminous, but somewhat 
heavy writer of this period. 

Chalmers was a native of Scotland. He emigrated to Maryland, but on the break- 
ing out of the war of Independence, lie took the side of the mother couiitiy and re- 
turned thither. His principal works are the following: Political Annals of the 
present United Colonies; A Collection of Treaties between Great Bi-itain and other 
Towers ; Opinions on Interesting Subjects arising from American Independence ; Com- 
parative Strength of Great Britain; Apology for the Believers of the Sliukespeare 
Papers ; Life of Thomas Ruddiman ; Life of Sir David Lindsay ; Life of, Mary Queen of 
Scots. 

Chalmers's greatest work was one which he barely lived to finish. It is called Cale- 
donia, and is a topographical and historical account of Great Britain from the earliest 
times. Three vols. -Ito were printed. The remainder of the work, intended for a 
fourth volume, is still in juanuscript. Mr. Chalmers's Caledonia is considered the 
best work on British antiquities ever produced. "It is impossible to speak too highly 
of the excellencies of this elaborate work — more elaborate, indeed, and copious, more 
abounding with original information, than any worli in Biitisli History or Antiquities 
which ever came fiom one author. It will rank with the immortal Britannia of Cam- 
den, whicli it far surpasses in industry of research and accumulation of matter." — Loud. 
Quar. Etv. 

Mitford. 

William Mitford, 1741-1827, is honorably connected with litera- 
ture by his elaborate work on the History of Greece. 

Mitford was a native of London. He studied at Oxford, and entered the legal profes- 
sion, but abandoned it for classical studies, and especially for the study of Grecian His- 
tory. Mitford is the author of an Inquiry into the Principles of Harmony in Language, 
which has some merit. Hi.-' threat work, however, is his History of Greece. This ex- 
tends from the beginning of ^ "eek history down to the death of Philip. It was the 
standard history, until supei'sedet by the works of Thirl wall and Grote, and even now 
possesses great value. Its chief dei-ect is that it is conceived in a partisan, not a judi- 
cial spirit. Mitford writes, throujxnout, with the animus of a Tory, and carries back 
to tlie days of Greece his antipathies to democracy and republics. He sees the events 
of Athenian political life through Tory spectacle. , as it were, and hence can see but 
little good in Demosthenes, and no evil in Philip. liis s,tyle is theoretical and involved. 

JoHX Gillies, LL. D., 1747-1836, is likewise extensively known 
as an historian of Greece. 

Gillies was a native of Scotland, and a graduate of the University of Glasgow. He 
was ^ijpointed, after the death of Robertson, historiographer to the King. His writ- 
ings are almost entirely historical. 

JVorlxS, — History of Ancient Greece, 2 vols., 4to; History of the World from the 
Reign of Alexander to Augustus, 1 vols.. 4to ; A View of the Reign of Frederick II. of 
Prussia, Svo; Translation of the Orations of Isocrates and Lycias, Svo; of Aristotle's 
Ethics and Politics, 2 vols , Kvo; of Aristotle's Rhetoric, Svo. 

Gillies's Greece and Mitford's were at one time the rival candidates 
for public favor, though both have now been superseded. 
a7 2C 



434 SCOTT AND HIS CO NT E M PO R A III ES. 

"This work [History of Greece] enters less into critical and recondite details than 
that of Mr. Mitford, though suflBciently accurate and comprehensive for all historical 
purposes; and is, in style of composition, decidedly supi^rior to it." — Samuel Warren. 

"The History of the World does not present such a luminous and masterly view of 
the Tery interesting period which it embraces, as would have been given by Mr. Gib- 
bon or Dr. Robertson ; but it exhibits proofs of learned research, and may, upon the 
wliole, be read with pleasure and advantage. It deserves no praise on the score of 
st3'le, which is commonly diffuse and overcharged, and often vulgar and slovenly." — 
Edinburgh Review. 

Kt. Hon. Edward King, Vi<count Kinr/.<iboroygh, 179-5-1837, a no- 
bleman of large means and liberal culture, devoted both his time and 
his fortune to the preparation of a work on the Antiquities of Mexico, 
in 9 vols., folio. 

" By this munificent undertaking, which no government probably would have, and 
few individuals could have, executed, he has entitled himself to the lasting gratitude 
01 every friend of science." — Prencott. 

"The drift of Lord Kingsborough's speculations is to establish the colonization of 
Mexico by the Israelites. To this the whole battery of his logic and learning is 
directed. For tliis hieroglypliics are unriddled, manuscripts compared, monuments 
delineated." 



John jS'ichols, 1744-1826, was an eminent English publisher, and 
was associated in partnership with William Bovryer, an equally well- 
known English printer. 

Nichols was for a number of years the editor of The Gentleman's Magazine. The 
Bowyer press, founded in 1699, is among the most famous in England. It Las been 
managed by successive generations of the Bowyer and the Nichols families, and from 
it have issued many of the most valuable contributions to English literature. 

Besides his labors as editor and publisher, Mr. Nichols wa-s the compiler or origi- 
nator of several valuable works, promiueut among which are The History and Anti- 
quities of Leicestershire ; Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Ccnturj" ; Progresses, 
etc.. of Queen Elizabeth and of King James, a curious collection of documents, 
incidents, costumes, and everything that can throw light on the reigns of these two 
sovereigns. 

The Ballantyxes (James, 1772-1833 ; John, 1774-1821,) are noticeable in literary 
history on account of their relations with Sir Walter Scott, being his friends and 
co-partners in the publishing business. James wrote for the Edinburgh Weekly 
Courant and for the Edinburgh Weekly Journal, the latter of which he edited. John 
was the author of a novel. The "Widow's Lodgings, and was the' confidante of Scott 
(luring tlie time that the latter was " The Great Unknown." Both these brothers 
were held in high esteem by Scott, Lockhart, Wilson, and others, for their abilities 
as critics, their fine literary taste, and for their wit and humor. 

AifDREW Beli., D. D., 1753-1832, is noticeable on account of hi^ 
comiection with an important educational experiment. 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 435 

Dr. Bell, who was a native of Scotland, instituted in Madras, India, a system of co- 
operative teaching, known as The Monitorial System. It was so successful there that 
Bell undertook to introduce it into England, and to recommend it as a scheme for 
universal adoption. He and Joseph Lancaster were for a time very conspicuous for 
their efforts in this line. His principal publication on the subject was National Edu- 
cation. Svo, 1812. "The boys at Madras taught so well, and the school under their 
teaching prospered so much, that the Doctor became intoxicated with the mode, 
and even allowed himself to suppose that in all cases and circumstances teaching by 
the pupils themselves is better than teaching by masters." — Montldy Revieiv. 

Thomas Clarksox, 1760-1846, is known the world over by his 
advocacy for the abolition of the slave-trade. 

Clarkson's attention was first called to this subject, while in the University, by a 
prize being offered by the Vice-Chancellor for the best essaj^ in Latin on the ques- 
tion, Is Involuntary Servitude Justifiable ? Clarkson competed for the prize, and won 
it. "While writing his essay, his mind became so filled with the subject that he gave 
up all other pursuits and devoted the remainder of his life to this one subject. He 
published Essays against the Slave-Trade; History of the Abolition of the Slave- 
Trade ; Portraiture of Quakerism, etc. 

Rev. Caleb C. Coltox, 1832, w^rote several works : Narrative of the Sampford 

Ghost ; Hypocrisy, a Satire ; Napoleon, a Poem ; The Conflagration of Moscow. More 
noticeable than all these was a little work called Lacon, or Many Things in Few 
Words. It is the best collection of apothegms in the language. Mr. Cotton's history 
is a shocking one. Forgetful of his sacred calling, and of the excellent teachings of 
his own Lacon, he addicted himself to gambling, and became so embarrassed in his 
affairs that he was obliged to abscond. After remaining for some time in the United 
States, he went to Paris, and resumed gaming, and with such success that he cleared a 
large amount of money by it (£25,000 in two years). He finallj' committed suicide. 
One of his own apothegms in Lacon is : " The gamester, if he die a martyr to his pro- 
fession, is doubly ruined. He adds his soul to every other loss, and by the act of suicide 
renounces earth to forfeit heaven." 

KoBERT Chaeees Dallas, 1754-1824, a brother of Alexander J. 
Dallas, and uncle to the American Btatesman, George M. Dallas, was 
related by marriage to Lord Byron, and had much influence with the 
poet. 

Dallas's writings are numerous. The following are the chief: Recollections of 
Lord Byron ; Aubrey, a Novel ; The Knights, Tales illustrative of the Marvellous ; 
The Siege of Rochelle, an historical Novel; Not at Home, a Comedy ; Percival, or Na- 
ture VinJicated, a Novel; Elements of Self-Knov.iedge ; Memoirs of the Last Years of 
Louis XVI.; The History of the Maroons. Translations of a large number of histor- 
ical works from the Fiench, cliieflj- connected with the historj^ of the French Revo- 
lution ; Miscellaneous Writings, consisting of Poems, Lucretia, a Tragedy, and Moral 
Essays. 

John Letden, M. D., 1775-1811, was a man of great and varied attainments, and 
was the subject of a warm friendship on the part of Sir Walter Scott, who has written 
his biographj". 



436 SCOTT AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Leyden was a native of Scotland; stivlicd at the University of Edinlmrgh, and en- 
tered the ministry of the Church of Scotland; but subsequently studied medicine and 
entered the service of the East India Company. His principal works are: Historical 
Sketches of the Discoveries of Europeans in Northern Africa; Scottish Descriptive 
Poems; Scenes of Infancy; Poetical Remains. Leyden also contributed The Eif 
King to Lewis's Tales of Wonder, and The Mermaid and The Court of Keeldar to 
Scott's Minstrelsy, be.sides being the author uf many i)liilological papers on oriental 
languages, some published in Asiatic Researches and others left in MS. 

"Indeed, as Leyden's reading was at all times too ostentatiously displayed, so in his 
poetry he was sometimes a little too ambitious in introducing scientific allusions or 
terms of art, which embarrassed instead of exalting the simplicity of his descriptions. 
But when he is contented with a pure and natural tone of feeling and expression, his 
poetical powers claim the admiration and sympathy of every reader." — Hir WalUr 
Scott. 

Elizabeth Ocilvy BrxGER, 1778-1^27, had very limited advantages of education, 
but a strong desire for knowledge, and an early imi)ulse towards authorship. Iler 
first poem, The Female Geniad, was published when she was only thirteen. She wrote 
poems, dramas, and novels, but had her chief success in history and biography. 
Works: Klopstock and his Friends, Memoirs of Mrs. Klizabeth Hamilton. Memoirs 
of Mary Queen of Scots, Memoirs of Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia, Memoirs 
of John Tobiii, Life of Auue Coleyn. She was the intimate friend of Mrs. Barbauld 
and Joanna Baillie. 

Thomas Hope, 1770-1831, is favorably known as a writer on 
Houseliold Furniture. 

Mr. Hope was a wealthy merchant of Amsterdam, who, after many travels, settled 
finally in London. He was a great lover of the fine arts, and had magnificent collections 
both in town and in th3 countrj-. In 1807, he published a work on Household Fur- 
niture and Internal Decorations, which was unmercifullj- ridiculed b}' Jeffrey in the 
Edinburgh Review, but which, it is now conceded, was the agent of introducing much 
better taste into the upholstery and decoration of houses. Hope produced several 
other art-treatises. He is cliiefly known, however, by his Anastasius, or Memoii-s of 
a Modern Greek. It embodies the experiences of the author's travels in the East, in 
the shape of a novel. This work, now little read, attracted much attention at the 
time of its appearance, and was ascribed to Lord Byron, who himself was not offended 
at such an imputation. 

James Cataxah Mukpht, 1760-1S16, a native of Ireland, is noted as a writer on 
architectural subjects. He travelled extensively in Spain and Portugal, publishing in 
1789 an account of his travels, and, in ISl^, a magnificent collection of engravings 
imder the title of Aratdan Antiquities of Spain. This work has always been considered 
the standard work on the subject, and is one of the most brilliant specimens of art 
and research. 

James Northcote, 1746-1831, is distinguished both as an artist and the author of 
several works on art-matters. Mr. Northcote studied for a number of years under the 
personal supervision of Sir Joshua Reynolds. In 1813 he published the Memoirs of 
Sir Joshua Reynolds, and subsequently the Life of Titian. He also prepared the de- 
signs for the two hnudi-ed and eighty engravings contained in the One Hundred 
Tables, etc., an illustrated work. Northcote was a brilliant conversationist, and Uaz- 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 437 

litt, the well-known critic, preserred and published many of his remarks in a volume 
entitled Conversations of Northcote. 

"The best converser I know is the best listener. I mean Xorthcote the painter. 
. . . ills manner is quite picturesque. There is an excess of character and naivete 
that never tires. His thoughts bubble up and sparkle like beads of old wine. . . . 
One of his tete-a-tetes would at any time make an essay ; but he cannot write himself, 
because he loses himself in the connecting passages, is fearful of the effect, and wants 
the habit of bringing his ideas into one focus or point of view." — Hazlitt. 

JoHX FiiAX3i.^ 1755-1826, the most eminent sculptor of modern 
times, won for himself a place in literature bv his Lectures on Sculp- 
ture, delivered at the Eoyal Academy. 

"These Lectures, as literary compositions, containing a clear and commanding 
view of sculpture, ancient and modern, abundant in just sentiments and wise re- 
marks, and such professional precepts as only experience can supply, merit more 
regard than they have as yet received. The account of the Gothic sculptures in 
England is as rich as a chapter of old romance, and infinitely more interesting. The 
whole of the Lectures on Beauty and Composition ought to be familiar to the mind 
of every student. The order of their arrangement is natural, and there is good sense 
and a feeling for all that is noble and heroic scattered over every page." — Allan Cun- 
ningham. 

Malcolm Laixg, 1762-lSlS, a native of Orkney, was a member of the bar, and also 
of Parliament. Besides editing the last volume of Henry's History of Great Britain 
and the life of James TI., he published two works of his own. The first is the His- 
tory of Scotland from James TI. to Queen Anne. This is an invaluable coutributiun 
to Scotch history, and, among other things, settled finally all doubts as to Mary's 
complicity in the murder of Darnley. The other work is entitled The Poems of Os- 
sian, containing the Poetical Works of James McPherson, with notes and illustrations. 
This was a serious assault upon Macpherson's literary honesty. — Sajitiel Laixg, 
b. ISIO, native of Orkney, and a younger brother of Malcolm Laiug, was the author of 
several valuable works of travel, etc., the most important of which are : Three Years' 
Piesidence in Norway ; A Tour in Sweden ; Heinskringla, or Chronicle of the Kings 
of Norway, a translation from the Icelandic ; On the Schism from the Church of 
Eome (occasioned by the exhibition of the Holy Coat at Treves in 184A). 

TiCESiiirs Knox, D. D., 1752-1821, a clergyman of the Church of England, was edu- 
cated at Oxford, and was for thirty^- three years Muster of the school at Tunbridge. 
His writings were nq.merous, and were well received. The following are the chief : 
Essays, Moral and Literary; Liberal Education ; Winter Evenings, 3 vols. ; Personal 
Nobility; Christian Philosophy, 2 vols.; Nature and Efiicacy of the Lord's Supper. 
Dr. Knox also compiled a work known as Elegant Extracts, in Prose and Terse, in 6 
vols., Svo, which had an extensive circulation in the United States. 

JoHif MacDiaesitd, 1779-180S, a native of Scotland, studied at Edinburgh and St. 
Andrew's, and was editor of St. James's Chronicle and ctmtributor to several periodi- 
cals. In 1S07 he published the Lives of British Statesmen, a series of valuable essays 
on Sir Thomas More, Burleigh, Strafford, and Clarendon. MacDiarmid' appears to have 
been a young writer of great promise, for his untimely death was sincerely mourned 
by his contemporaries. His "Lives" has been commended by Hallam, Disraeli, and 
i'oster. 

87* 



438 SCOTT AXD HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Robert MvcNisn. M. D., 1S02-1837, a native of Glasgow, was a contributor to Black- 
wood's Ma;^aziiie, Frazer's, and other jjeriodicals. He also published two volumes of 
sketches: The Anatomy of Drunkenness, and The Anatomy of Sleep, which achieved 
a lasting reputation for their author. 

"This little book (The Anatomy of Drunkenness) is evidently the production of a 
man of genius. The style is singularly neat, terse, concise, and vigorous, far beyond 
the reach of any ordinary mind ; the strain of sentiment is such as does infinite honor 
to the autlior's heart : and the observation of human life by which every page is char- 
acterized speaks a bold, active, and philosophical intellect. As a medical treatise, it 
is excellent ; and to those who stand in need of advice or warning it is worth a hun- 
dred sermons."' — Blackwood. 

Thomas Medwix, R A., 1780-1809, brought himself into note in the early part of the 
century by publishing Conversations of Lord Byron, which occasioned a good deal of 
sharp criticism. He also published A Life of Shelley; The Angler in Wales; and 
Ahasuerus the Wanderer, a Dramatic Legend. 

Sir John Cam Hobhocse, 1786-1869. is chiefly known through his intimate associa- 
tion with Lord Byron and a volume of Travels which he published in 1812, giving an 
account of their travels in Albania, etc. llobhouse also published a volume of Poems, 
partly original, partly imitations and translations of the classics, and an account of 

the last reign of Napoleon, 2 vols., 8vo. 

Barry Edward O'Meara, 1778-1836, Napoleon's physician at 
St. Helena, acquired great notoriety by his various narratives exposing 
the alleged brutality of Sir Hudson Lowe in the treatment of his illus- 
trious prisoner. 

O'Meara was a native of Ireland, and held the position of surgeon in the Royal Navy 
on the Bellerophon, when Napoleon surrendered. He accompanied the ex-emperor 
to St. Helena, and remained there three years, when he quarrelled with Sir Hudson 
Lowe, the governor, and returned to England. Here he preferred charges a;:ainst 
Lowe, but was not sustained, and was dismissed from the service. O'Meara published 
An Exposition, etc., in reply to an anonymous pamphlet defending Lowe. He also 
published the Letters of Las Casas, with an introduction, and Napoleon in Exile, or a 
Voice from St. Helena. This latter work, giving the details of Napoleon's life in 
exile, met with a large sale, and, in connection with the preceding ones, provoked an 
angry discussion, in which all the reviews of the day took part, on one side or another, 
according to their political sympathies. Whether O'Meara be right or not in all his 
statements, the popular verdict has long agopronounced against Lowe as wholly unfit 
for such a position. 

Dr. Parr. 

Samuel Parr, LL. D., 1747-1825, had in his day a prodigious 
reputation for classical learning, but the works which he has left do 
not justify the high estimation in which he was once held. 

Parr was a clergyman of the Church of England, and was celebrated as a scholar 
and a conversationist. His published works and sermons are voluminous. Parr 
was at one time a violent partisan of the "Whigs, and came near being made a bishop. 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 439 

The best of his writings, perhaps, are The Characters of Charles James Fox, and his 
buok notices published in the then existing monthly reviews. 

Richard Payne Knight, 1750-1824, a native of Herefordshire, 
was a prominent Greek scholar of his time. 

He published several essays and works of a philological character, among them an 
Essay on the Greek Alphabet, and an edition of the Iliad and the Odyssey, with pro- 
legomena. He also published a feeble poem, entitled The Progress of Civil Society, 
which was parodied by Canning and others in The Anti-Jacobin. Mr. Knight is also 
known for his famous collection of Greek coins and bronzes, bequeathed by him to 
the British Museum. 

Sir William Gell, 1777-1836, was very eminent as a classical 
antiquary. 

He was educated at Cambridge, and was Fellow of one of its colleges. He spent a 
large part of his life in Greece and Italy, making those researches which were the 
foundation of his numerous works. The following are his chief publications : To- 
pography of Troy and its Vicinity, folio; Geography and Antiquity of Ithaca, 4to; 
Itinerary of Greece, 4to ; Itinerary of the Morea, 8vo ; Attica, fol.. Topography of 
Rome and its Vicinity, 3 vols., 8vo ; Pompeiana, or Description of Topography, Edi- 
fices, and Ornaments of Pompeii, 2 vols., imp. 8vo. Sir William Gell's works were all 
of the highest order of excellence, for accuracy, thoroughness, and elegance. 

" Cell's notions of authorship were of a very aristocratic nature. All his works were 
brought out on so large and extensive a scale as to be out of the reach of that class of 
readers for whom his topographical and antiquarian researches would have been espe- 
cially useful, — for travellers in those countries whose remains were described by him." 
— Dr. Madden. 

Peter Elmsley, D. D., 1773-1825, was an Oxford scholar, and one 
of the most accomplished Grecians of his day. 

He wrote for the Edinburgh critical reviews of Heyne's Homer ; Schweighauser's 
Athetifeus ; Blomfield's Prometheus : and Porson's Hecuba. He edited, with con- 
summate ability, The Acharnenses; (Edipus Tyrannus ; (Edipus Coloneus: Heraclidaj ; 
IMedea ; and Bacchge. These labors gave him a high reputation throughout Europe 
as a consummate Greek scholar. 

Joro Chetwode Eustace, 1765-1815, a Catholic priest, and an elegant writer, was the 
author of a work Avhich was once in general repute, A Classical Tour through Italy, 
2 vols., 4to. It is written in a pleasant, attractive style, and passed through many 
editions. 

Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, 1731-1 828, rose to high distinction in the British 
Foreign Service, being made Lieutenant-Governor of Java and Sumatra. He published 
several interesting works on Java, the cliief of which is a history of the island, in two 
large volumes, quarto. It gives ample details concerning the archaeology, literature, 
law, manners, mythology, etc., of the Malayan Archipelago, and a comparative vocabu- 
lary of five or six of the languages. Sir Thomas's valuable cullection of plants, ani- 
mals, and manuscripts was lost by a fire at sea, on his homeward voyage in 1824. 



440 SCOTT AXD HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Sir John- Malcolm, 1760-1833, a native of Scotland, distinguished himself in the 
East India service, and rose to the post of Governor of Bombaj-. Sir John is tlie 
author of a numi.erof works ujion oriental history and manners. The most impor- 
tant are: A History of Persia; Memoir of Central India: Political History of India 
from 1784 to 1823 ; and Sketches of Persia. He is a warm advocate of British aggran- 
di/enient in the East. He is described as amiable in disposition, but of great enter- 
prise and perse veni nee. " Sir John Malcolm's name will alwa>8 maintain a respect- 
able i)lace in the annals of Indian diplomacy; but his published works are proli.v, 

and deficient in the reach and vigor of mind required iu a philosophical historian." 

JUcCuUoch. 

The Percy Anecdotes.— Sholto and Reuben Percy were the a.'ssumed names of two 
editors. Byerly and Robertson, who published, in 1820, a collection called "The Perry 
Anecdotes," which met with immense success, and which was lor a time the standard 
collection of jests and humorous stories. 

JoHx GORTOX published, in 1S-28-1S.30, a Biographical Dictionary, in 2 vols., Svo. sub- 
sequently enlarged to 4 vols., which was regarded as a work of great convenience and 
utility. It has since been supersedeil by other and more complete works. Little is 
known of the author. 

Michael Brt.vx, 1757-1821, wrote a Biographical and Critical Dictionary of Paint- 
ers and Engraver-s, 2 vols., 4to, (1813-1816, j which was held in high esteem as a standard 
work on that subject. 



Joiix Lempeiere, D. D., 1760-1S24, wa.s once universally known 
among scholars by his Classical Dictionary, 

Lempriere was a native of the Isle of Jersey, and a graduate of O.\ford. He was a 
clergyman of the Church of England, and for some time Head Master of Abingdon 
and of Exeter Gram mar-Schools. He is especially noted for his Classical Dictionary, 
which for a long time wiis the only manual of the kind in English for the use of 
classical students. He published some other things, but the Classical Dictionary is 
the only one b}' which he is now kuuwn. 

John Joxes, LL. D., 1765-1827, is known chiefly by his Greek 
Lexicon. 

Jones was a Unitarian preacher, and afterwards a teacher in London. The following 
are his principal publications: A Greek and English Lexicon ; The Epistle of Paul to 
the Romans Ansilj'zed; Ecclesiastical Researches, 2 vols., Svo: A New Tersion of ilie 
Epistles to the Colossiaus, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and the General Epistle of 
James ; A New Tersion of the First Three Chapters of Genesis. His Lexicon is note- 
worthy as being the first iu Greek and EnylUh. All the Greek Lexicons before that 
were in Greek and Latin. 

Mungo Park. 

MuNGO Park, 1771-1805, was a celebrated English explorer of the 
interior of Africa. 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 441 

He made two explorations of the River Niger district, one in 1795-7, the other in 
1805, when he was drowned. The account of his first trip was published by himself; 
the account of the second appeared after his death. Although Mungo Park's travels 
have been eclipsed in interest by those of subsequent explorers, the results of his 
enterprise are of permanent value. 

Dexham and Clapperton". — Hugh Clapperton, 1788-1827, was a celebrated traveller, 
whose explorations in Africa, in connection witli Denhani, Lander, and others, added 
much to our knowledge respecting that continent. He died on his journey, but his 
notes were preserved, and formed a part of ihe materials of Denham and Clapperton'a 
Travels. He was a Scotchman. — Col. Dixon Denham, 1786-1828, a British officer, was 
associated with Clapperton in African explorations. The work, Denham and Clapper- 
ton's Travels, was written chiefly by Denham. 



Burekhardt. 

John Ltjdwig Burckhardt, 1784-1817, was a traveller of great 
celebrity, and one of the earliest of those whose names are associated 
with African exploration. 

Burckhardt was a native of Switzerland, but became an Englishman by adoption. 
Ilis works, all cf which are considered as among the best of the class, are: Travels in 
Nubia ; Travels in Syria and the Holy Land ; Travels in Arabia ; Notes on the Bedouins 
and V^ahabys ; Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians. 

KiCHApD Lander, 1804-1834, was noted as an enterprising trav- 
eller. 

He made thi-ee journeys into the interior of Africa, — the first with Clapperton, the 
second with his brother John Lander, and the third with Macgregor Laird and Dr. 
Oldfleld. Lander was not a man of letters, but he took notes of what he saw, and 
these formed a valuable part of the materials for the important works of travel which 
were the fruits of these expeditions. 

Edward Daniel Clarke, LL. D., 1769-1822, Professor of Miner- 
alogy in Cambridge University, derives his chief celebrity from his 
Travels. 

In company with a pupil, he set out on a journey which was intended to last six 
months, but which actually lasted more than three years. They visited Denmark, 
Sweden, Lapland, Finland, Russia, Tartary, Circassia, Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine, 
Egypt, and Greece, returning across the Balkan Mountains through Germany and 
Trance. His account of these travels was published in 6 vols., 4to. They are consid- 
ered the best books of travel by any Englishman, — which is certainly saying much, 
as the English excel in this line of adventure. "If Humboldt be the first, Clarke is 
the second, traveller of his age." — Dihdin. 

William Coxe, 1747-182S, an Archdeacon in the English Church, 
was a very voluminous writer of travels and history. Few persons 
who have written so much have written so well. 



442 SCOTT AND HIS CONTE M POK A RIES. 

For each of the large number of works that Archdeacon Coxe produced, he has 
obtained a verdict of high excellence from judges fully competent to decide. He 
made several excursions to different countries with young members of the nobility as 
pupils, and in this \xay laid the foundation for his various works of travel. His chief 
publications are the following: Sketches of the Natural, Civil, and Political State of 
Switzerland ; Travels in Switzerland and in the Country of the Grisons ; Travels in 
Russia, Poland, Sweden, and Denmark ; Account of the Russian Discoveries between 
Asia and America; A Comparative View of the Russian Discoveries ; Account of the 
Prisons and Hospitals in Russia, Sweden, and Denmark ; Memoirs of Sir Robert Wal- 
pole ; Memoirs of John Duke of Marlborough ; History of the House of Austria ; 
Memoirs of the Kings of Spain of the House of Bourbon. Archdeacon Coxe pub- 
lished also several large topogi'aphical works, besides some of a religious character. 
A set of his Historical- Works and Travels was published in 24 vols., imperial 4lo. 

Henry David Inglis, 1795-1835, a native of Edinburgh, travelled extensively in 
Europe, and embodied the i-esults of his journeyings in a number of very entertaining 
and trustworthy sketches. The principal are: Journey through Norway, Sweden, and 
Denmark; Tour through Switzerland, etc.; The New Gil Bias; A Journey through 
Ireland. 



Claudius James Eich, 1787-1821, is one of that band of eminent 
scliolars who by their researches have revealed to the world the long- m 
buried history of Babylon and Nineveh. ^ 

Rich was a native of France. He removed to England, when very young, and en- 
tered the East India service. By his linguistic talents he attracted the attention of 
Sir James Mackintosh, and subsequently became that gentleman's son-in-law. Rich 
■was for five years the East India Company's Resident in Bagdad. His health failing, 
he resigned, and passed the remainder of his life in travels in Asia. He accumulated 
and also published important information concerning the regions about Babylon and 
Nineveh, which was turned to great account by Layard, Rawlinson, and other subse- 
quent orientalists. Rich's works are A Memoir on the Ruins of Babylon, A Second 
Memoir of the same. Narrative of a Residence in Koordistan, and Narrative of 
Journey to the Site of Babylon. His collection of manuscripts has been placed iaj 
the British Museum. 



Maj. James Rennell, 1742-1830, a native of England, seiwed under Clive in India, and 
was made Surveyor-General of Bengal. He travelled extensively in Asia and Africa, 
and gave to the world the results of his observations in several magnificent works. 
These, although superseded in part by the discoveries of recent travellers, still possess | 
great histoiical value. The chief of them are Memoirs of a Map of Hindostan, where i 
for the first time the Punjab (or five branches of the Indus) is accurately laid down, 
a Memoir of the Geography of Africa, The Geographical System of Herodotus, and] 
Geographical Illustrations of the Anabasis. 




CHAPTER XV. 

WORDS^TVORTH AND HiS CONTEMPORARIES. 

The present chapter embraces the time from 1830 to 
1850. It includes the long period of tranquillity that ensued 
after the accession of Louis Philippe to the throne of France. 
It was a time of general peace and thrift throughout the 
world. 

The writers of this period may be divided into six sec- 
tions : 1. The Poets, beginning with Wordsworth ; 2. Writ- 
ers of Novels and Tales, beginning with Miss Mitford ; 3. 
Writers on Literature, Politics, and Science, beginning with 
Sydney Smith ; 4. Writers on Religion and Theology, be- 
ginning with Chalmers ; 5, Writers on History, Biography, 
Antiquities, and Travel, beginning with Lingard ; 6. Mis- 
cellaneous Writers, beginning with Arnold of Rugby. 

I. TH E POETS. 

Wordsworth. 

William Wordsworth, 1770-1850, had been contemporary 
with Coleridge and Southey and the other illustrious writ- 
ers mentioned in the preceding chapter, and had risen to 
fame with them. But he continued steadily to rise after 
those stars had set, and during all the latter part of his 
course he reigned supreme in the poeti(;al firmament, in 
solitary and unapproachable splendor. From 1840 to 1850 

443 



444 WOBDSWORTH — HIS COX TEMPORARIES. 

he was by general consent tlie first of living poets in Eng- 
land. 

Early Career. — The life of AYordswortli is, witli a single exception, 
remarkably uneventfal. His parents dying wkile he was young, he was 
sent to school at Penrith, and afterwards to Hawkshead, in Lancashire. 
Here he grew up a sharer in all the merry, boisterous sports of an 
English public school, but preserving a decided poetic individuality. 
He has bequeathed to us, in his posthumous work, The Prelude, a 
beautiful description of his school-boy life, and of the "gray -haired 
dame" with whom he lived. From school he went to Cambridge, 
where he took his degree of B. A. in 1791. 

His Republicanism. — Before graduation, however, Wordsworth had 
visited France, then in the throes of the great devolution, and had 
become intimately acquainted with some of the Girondists. The ioi- 
pression made upon the yoimg poet by the scenes and characters of 
the Revolution was never to be effaced. He became for the time an 
ardent republican, so much so that he could not even sympathize wiih 
his comitry in her war upon France. 

The Reaction. — In time came the reaction, brought about by the 
crimes and anarchy of the Revolution itself, and Wordsworth turned 
back in righteous horror. But the original impression still remained. 
It had deepened the poet's sensibilities, and enkindled a strong, undy- 
ing love of humanity ; it had been the " storm-and-stress " period of an 
otherwise placid soul. The shock of disappointment had turned the 
poet into a j)hilosopher, seeking to reconcile God's ways to the human 
understanding. Henceforth Wordsworth was to be the great preacher 
of honor gained only through trial, of self-discipline, of abiding trust 
in Divine wisdom. From this time on, the poet's life became one of 
tranquil meditation and composition. 

Domestic Quiet. — Froin Raisley Calvert, an intimate friend and admirer of 
his genius, Wordsworth received a legacy, small in itself, but enough to satisfy his 
modest wants. His sister Dorothy — his other self — came to live with him. Tor a 
few years they lived in retirement at Eacedown Lodge, Dorsetshire. Wordsworth 
hid already published two ijoems, The Evening Walk, and Descriptive Sketches, whicli 
are not remarkable in themselves, but which already reveal the poet's characteristics. 

Connection tvitJi Coleridge. — In 1797 Wordsworth removed to Alforden, to be 
near Coleridge, Avh ise acquaintance he had marie, and who w;\s from the first an un- 
hesitating believer in Wordswortli's genius. Out of this intercourse sprang the fainons 
Lyrical Ballads published in 1798. The understanding was that Coleridge should 
'•take up the supernatural and romantic," while Wordsworth undertook to "give the 
charm o." n 'velty to the things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the 
buperuatural by awakening the mind's attention to the lethargy of custom, and hy 



THE POETS. 445 

directing to the loveliness and the wonders of the -world around us." Accordingly, 
Coleridge produced The Ancient Mariner, and Wordsworth a number of short pieces, 
among them some of his very best, such as An Anecdote for Fath*-rs, We are Seven, 
Lines written in Early Spring, Tintern Abbey. Others again, like the Idiot Boy, are 
unquestionably weak. Xot only did the Lyrical BiiUads meet with no favor ; it was 
condemned in unmeasured terms by critics of high and low degree. Coleridge came 
off more lightly, but Wordsworth's share of the venture was denounced as the veriest 
'* trash" and "twaddle." 

But Wordsworth was a law unto himself. Apparently unruffled by severity and ridi- 
cule, he moved on in his self-appointed way. His circumstances grew easier by the 
payment of a long-standiug debt owed to his father's estate. He married, in 1802, his 
cousin, Mary Hutchinson, by whom he had five children. After living for some years 
at Grasraere, and then at Allan Bank, he settled permanently, in 1S13, at Kydal Mount, 
in Cumberland; and there calmly awaited the slow-coming verdict of the public. 

The records of literature present scarcely another such instance of a poet's growing 
into supreme favor and repute in despite of determined opposition. At first Words- 
worth had only the admiration of a few appreciative friends — Coleridge, De Quince}-, 
Southey — and the almost adoration of his wife and sister. But slowly, year after 
year, prejudice was disarmed, ridicule was silenced, the circle of admirei-s grew larger, 
the ])opular understanding of the poet's genius was quickened. At his death, Words- 
worth was not only the ofBcial poet-laureate, but the acknowledged monarch of Eng- 
lish letters. 

Wordsworth himself contributed nothing beyond his works towards bringing about 
this wonderful revolution in popular opinion. Xo jjoet probably ever went less out 
of his way to seek favor or notice, cared less for the thoughts and opinions of con- 
temporaries, read less either for information or pleasure. What he gave to the world 
was elicited by close communion with nature in her myriad shapes and hues, or evolved 
little by little from the slow-working loom of his own imagination and meditation. 

Sis Works. — After publishing, in 1802, a second, and enlarged, edition of his Lyr- 
ical Ballads, he next gave to the world, in 1807, two volumes of Poems. In 1814, ap- 
peared The Excursion ; in 1815, The White Doe of Rylstone; in 1S19, Peter Bell: in 
1S20, The River Duddon; in 1S20, Memorials of a Tour on the Continent; in 1835, 
Yarrow Revisited : in 1838, the book of Sonnets. The Prelude was published after 
his death, but it was begun as far back as 1789, and finished in 1805. 

Wordsworth's position in English literature is now fully understood. He is pre- 
eminently the poet of the reflective imagination. He has not the passion of Byron or 
of Tennyson, or the myriad mind of Shakespeare. He has not the vigor of Milton, 
but he stands next to Milton in purity, sweetness, gravity of thought and style, and 
broad humanity. His demerit — the one that aroused at first such a storm of hostile 
criticism — is that he often takes the fatal step from the sublime, or at least the im- 
aginative, to the ridiculous. 

A signal example of this defect is to be found in Peter BeU. The description of the 
potter is wonderfully artistic ; in short, the character is a creation. But the conclud- 
ing lines are simply puerile. That a hardened outlaw may be converted from the 
error of his ways no one denies. Only the artist must show us fully, step by step, how 
the change is wrought ; and when he succeeds, we say that he has produced a mas- 
terpiece of psychological analysis. But to motive such a conversion through the 
instrumentality of a braying ass, and to dispose of the potter by saying that he 

Forsook his crimes, renounced his folly, 
And after ten months' melancholy 
Became a good and honest man, 
38 



446 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

is simply an outrage upon common sense. Wordsworth seems at times to be wanting 
in the sense of the incongruous, and he is always wanting in true passion. While a: le 
to depict passionate characters, he fails to detect the subtle couuectiou between mo- 
tive and action, character and life. 

With all his defects, however, Wordsworth is a great poet. He has ennobled the 
poetic style, and given to it philosophic depth: he has awakened a love for tlu! 
lowly both in nature and in man ; he has given a healthier tone to popular sen- 
timent. 

No two men ever difiFered more widely in personal character thnn Wocdsworth and 
Dickens,— the one serene, contemplative ; (he other bustling, eager, ostentatious. 
Yet the poet's exaltation of the lowly prepared the public for the folk-sketches of the 
great novelist. 

Wordsworth's longer works are less read than his shorter pieces. The Excursion 
and The Prelude, abounding as they do in beautiful passages, are not so generally 
known and cherished as the little poems to Lucy, the Lines written in Early Spring. 
We are Seven, Resolution and Independence, the Sonnets, the Ode on the Intimations 
of Immortality, and a hundred others which it would be superfluous to name. 

The reader who wishes to form an idea of the slow and impeded growth of Words- 
worth's popularity will do well to consult Henry Crabb Robinson's Diary. Tlie 
diarist, who was from the first a devoted friend, never neglected an opportunity to 
do battle for the i)oet, and his record gives us a rare glimpse into the ways and work- 
ings of the literary. world at that time. 

Christopher Wordsworth, D. D., 1774-1846, Ma.ster of Trinitv, 
and brother of the poet, was educated at Cambridge, and held various 
appointments in the University and in the church, the most important 
being that of Master of Trinity, which he held from 1820 till 1841. 

He published Six Letters on the Use of the Greek Article in the Nevr Testament ; 
Ecclesiastical Biography, 6 vols., 8vo, a selection from various sources, with notes ; 
Christian Institutes, 4 vols., 8vo, also a selection from the writings of eminent divines ; 
Reasons for declining to subscribe to the Bible Society (several pamphlets^ : Who 
Wrote the Eikon Basilike? (several pamphlets.) Dr. Wordsworth maintained that 
the book was written by King Charles himself, and not by Bishop Gauden. 

Charles Wordsworth, D. C. L., 1806 , Bishop of St. An- 
drew's, Scotland, son of Christopher Wordsworth, and nephew of the 
poet, was born at Bocking, in Essex, and educated at Oxford, where he 
gained great distinction for cla.ssical scholarship. 

Besides several Greek and Latin school-books, he has published. Christian Boyhood 
at a Public School, a Collection of Sermons and Lectures, delivered at Winchester 
College ; History of the College of St. Mary Winton ; A United Church of Scotland, 
England, and Ireland Advocated : Shakespeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible ; 
Christian Instruction Preparatory to Confirmation and First Communion, etc. He 
became Bishop in 1S52. 

Christopher Wordsworth, D. D., 1S08 , Bishop of Lincoln, 

and also son of the preceding, was educated at Cambridge, where he 
won the highest honors for scholarship. 



THE POETS. 



447 



He graduated B. A. in 1830; traYellcd in Greece in 1832, '33; was elected 'Fellow 
of Trinity ; was appointed Public Orator at Cambridge in 1836 ; was Head Master of 
Harrow from 1836 to 1844 ; became Canon of Westminster in 1844 ; and Bishop of Lin- 
coln in 1869. 

Bishop Wordsworth's writings are in the highest repute for scholarship, and for the 
vigorous grasp which he gives to whatever he has in hand. Among his publications 
on classical subjects may be named, Athens and Attica, Journal of aKesidence there; 
Greece, Pictorial, Descriptive, and Historical ; luscrijjtiones Pompeiauge, ancient 
writings copied from the walls of the city of Pompeii. Other works: Preces Select*, 
prayers for the use of the Harrow School ; Sermons, preached at Harrow; Discourses 
on Public Education; The Destructive Character of the Church of Kome ; On the 
Canon of Scriptures; Lectures on the Apocalypse; The Apocalypse, an edition with 
translations and notes ; Is the Church of Rome the Babylon of the Apocalypse? The 
New Testament in the Original Greek, with Notes, 4 vols., 8vo, a work of uncommon 
value ; The Inspiration of the Bible; The Interpretation of the Old and New Testa- 
ment; The Holy Bilde, with Notes and Introductions, 5 vols., 8vo; Memoirs of Wil'- 
liam Wordsworth, 2 vols., 8vo ; The Church of Ireland, her history and claims; and a 
large number of other volumes and pamphlets. Bishop Wordsworth is indeed one of 
the most voluminous writers of the day. 

Keble. 
John Keble, 1792-1866, gained his chief distinction as a 
writer of sacred lyrics, though honored also for his theolog- 
ical writings, and held in the highest reverence for the sin- 
gular sweetness of his disposition and the purity of his life. 

Keble was born at Fairford, Gloucestershire, and educated at Ox- 
ford. After leaving the University, he was for twentj years Curate 
for his father in the church at Fairford. He became Professor of 
Poetry at Oxford in 1833, and Yicar of Hawley in 1835. 

Keble"3 name is intimately associated with that of Ne%vman and Pusey in the so- 
called Tractarian movement, which caused such excitement in England thirty or forty 
years ago. According to Newman's statement, Keble was the originator and master- 
mind of the movement. 

His best known works are : The Christian Year, or Thoughts in Terse for the Sun- 
days and Holidays throughout the Year ; his Lyra Innocentium, or Thoughts in Yerse 
on Children; his contributions to Tracts for the Times; and his article in the London 
Quarterly on Sacred Poetry. He was also one of the editors of the Bibliotheca 
Patrum Ecclesise Catholicaj, or Library of Fathers of the Catholic Church. 

Keble appears to have been a man of uncommon talents, and of the most winning 
disposition. While at Oxford, he was the idol of the University. His subsequent life 
was mainly one of retirement and parochial duty. His Christian Year is the most 
valuable contribution to religious poetry made in the present century, and has been 
received as a household treasure in families of every creed. 

" Keble is a poet whom Cowper himself would have loved ; for in him pietj' inspires 
genius, and fancy and feeling are celestialized by religion. We peruse his book in a 
toue and temper of spirit similar to that which is breathed on us by some calm day in 
spring, when 

' Heaven and earth do make one imagery,' 



448 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

and all that imagery is serene and still, — cheerful in the main, yet with a touch and 
tinge of melancholy which makes all the blended bliss and beauty at once more en- 
during and profound. We should no more think of criticizing such poetry than of 
criticizing the clear blue skies, the soft green earth, the ' liquid lapse' of an unpol- 
luted stream that 

' Doth make sweet music with the enamelled stones, 

Giving a gentle kiss to every flower 

It overtaketh on its pilgrimage.' 
Beauty is there, — purity and peace; as we look and listen we partake of the uni- 
versal calm, and feel in nature the presence of Him from whom it emanated." — Chris- 
topher North. 

Croly. 

George Croly, LL. D., 1780-1860, attained great celeb- 
rity as an author, and was almost equally distinguished as 
a poet and as a writer of prose. 

Croly was a native of Dublin, and was educated at Trinity College, 
in that city. He was a clergyman of the Church of England, and had 
a parish in London, where he attained celebrity as a preacher. 

His writings are very numerous, and hold a high rank. Most of them are of a pop- 
ular character. The following are the chief: Catiline, a Tragedj', and Other Poems ; 
Paris in 1S15, and Other Poems ; The Angel of the World, an Arabian Tale ; Sebastian, 
a Spanish Tale; The Modern Orlando, a Poem; Poetical Works ; Salathiel, a Story 
of the Past, the Present, and the Future ; Marston, or the Soldier and Statesman ; The 
Year of Liberation; Tales of the St. Bernard; Historical Sketches, Speeches, and 
Characters ; The History of George IT. ; Life of Burke ; Works of Alexander Pope, 
with Memoir and Critical Notes; Works of Jeremy Taylor, with Life and Notes; 
Beauties of the English Poets ; Divine Providence, or the Three Cycles of Revelation ; 
The Apocalypse of St. John, a New Interpretation ; The True Idea of Baptism ; 
Speeches on the Papal Aggression; Exposition on Popery and the Popish Question; 
The Admission of Jews into Parliament ; Marriage with a Deceased Wife's Sister ; 
etc., etc. 

Dr. Croly succeeded as a poet, as a writer of fiction, as an historian, as a literary edi- 
tor, as a religious polemic. In this long list of works, there is scarcelj- one that at 
the time of its publication did not make its mark. His Catiline, in poetry, his Sala- 
thiel, in fiction, his George IT. and Edmund Burke, in history, fall but little short of 
being of the first class in their several kinds. 

Ebenezer Elliott. 

Ebenezer Eleiott, 1781-18-19, is familiarly known as "The Corn- 
Law Etiymer." 

Elliott was obliged in his youth to work at the forge in an iron foundry in York- 
shire, and had few advantages of education. But an inward prompting led him to 
the cultivation of letters by means of private study, and in his case, as in that of 
several others in like circumstances, the inspiration to verse first came from reading 
Thomson's Seasons. 



THE POETS. 449 

Elliott's first ventures with the j-iublic, Tlie YernPil Walk, and Night, -were unsuc- 
cessful. He published .also a volume of poems, with like want of success. But 
Southey encouraged him to go on. ''There is power in the least of these tales, but 
the higher you pitch your tones, the better you succeed. Thirty years ago, they 
would have made your reputaticn; thirty years hence the world will wonder that they 
did not do so." 

But Elliott was out of his element in the subjects which thus far he had chosen. 
Neither his education nor his rugged nature fitted him for gentle themes. The agita- 
tion for the repeal of the corn laws, and the light thrown upon the appalling hard- 
ships of the operatives, enlisted, of course, Elliott's warmest sympathies, and fur- 
nished him with topics which called out all the resources of his strong and fiery na- 
ture. His Corn-Law Khymes had the ring of the anvil. They received almost imme- 
diate recognition, and gave the author an established jjosition as The Poet of the 
People. 

"The inspiration of his verse is a fiery hatred of injustice. TVithout possessing 
much creative power, he almost places himself beside men of genius, by the singular 
intensity and might of his sensibility. He understands the art of condensing pas- 
sion. 'Spread out thunder,' says Schiller, 'into its single tones, and it becomes a 
lullaby lor children; pour it forth together, in one quick peal, and the royal sound 
shall move the heavens.' The great ambition of Elliott is to thunder. He is a 
brawny man, of nature's own make, with more than the usual portion of the old 
Adam stirring within him, and he says, 'I do well to be angry.' The mere sight of 
tyranny, bigotry, meanness, prompts his smiting invective. His poetry would hardly 
have been written by a man who was not physically strong. You can hear the ring 
of his anvil, and see the sparks fly off from the furnace, as you read his verse." — 
Whipple. 

Kev. Eichabd Harris Barham, 1788-1845, a humorous writer, 
is belter known by his assumed name of Thomas Ingoldsbv. 

The Ingoldsby Legends, a series of tales in verse and prose, appeared first in Bent- 
ley's Miscellany, and were received with general favor. None of these probably had a 
wider circulation than the thoroughly laughable story of the famous Lord Tomnoddy. 
My Cousin Nicholas, a story of college-life, came out in Blackwood. Mr. Barham was 
also one of the chief contributors to Gorton's Biographical Dictionary. He was a 
friend of Sydney Smith, Theodore Hook, and other wits of the day. 

" There is a deficiency in the Legends w^hich must prevent their becoming classic. 
They are devoid of poetry. Master of the grotesque as he was, Barham had no mastery 
of the picturesque. Keen to see and seize the humorous aspects of affairs, he had none 
of that deeper humor which creates ch;iracter. A real poet, who had written fifty or 
more eccentric legends, could not have help"ed inventing or describing certain indi- 
vidual chiiracters in the course of his work. He must have done it unconsciously, 
must have done it if even he had tried to aA-oid it. There are two tests on the verj- 
surface of the true poet. If he describes a scene, you see it; if he describes a man, 
you know him. Barham's grotesque descriptions are often remarkable ; indeed, his 
legends somewhat remind us of the hideous gurgoyles of old churches, wherein tradi- 
tion sayeth the old ecclesiastic architects depicted their enemies, making of them 
waterspouts, that during rain they might seem to vomit. The men who carved those 
gurgoyles could not have sculptured an Apollo ; and of Barham it may be said that, 
though he wi'ote laughable stories with supreme felicity, he never produced a line 
of poetry." — British Quarterly Review. 

38* 2D 



450 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 



Hood. 

Thomas Hood, 1798-1845, was the prince of comic humorists, the 
most audacious and successful of punsters. 

Hood was the son of a London publisher. He left the counting-house for the en- 
graver's stool, and that in turn for the life of a man of letters He became sub-editor 
of The London Magazine, editor of The New Monthly, and, for one year, of The Gem, 
besides being a regular contributor to Punch. 

Hood's most successful publications were his Whims and Oddities, The Comic An- 
nual, Hood's Own, Up the Rhine, Whimsicalities, Hood's Comic Album. The three 
most famous of his serious poems are The Dream of Eugene Aram, The Song of the 
Shirt, and The Bridge of Sighs. The two latter, apart from their beauty of sentiment, 
are probably unsurpassed in English verse in the wonderfully delicate interlacing 
of their rhymes. 

Hood is the most comical humorist in the language, and also the most inveterate 
punster. No English writer has ever equalled him in the audacity with which he 
plays upon words. In the single ballad of Miss Killmansegg and Her Wooden Leg 
the puns number many hundreds. Still, even in Hood's most fantastic pieces, there 
is always a deep undercurrent of genuine pathos. 

" Hood's verse, whether serious or comic — whether serene like a cloudless autumn 
evening, or sparkling with puns like a frosty January midnight with stars — was ever 
pregnant with materials for thought. . . . Like everj' author distinguished for true 
comic humor, there was a deep vein of melancholy pathos running through his mirth ; 
and even when his sun shone brightly, its light seemed often reflected as if only over 
the rim of a cloud. Well may we say, in the words of Tennyson, 'Would he could 
have stayed with us ! ' for never could it be more truly recorded of any one — in the 
words of Hamlet characterizing Yorick — that he was a fellow of infinite jest, of most 
excellent fancy." — D. M. Moir. 

Hook. 

Theodore Edward Hook, 1788-1841, another humorist and wit 
of this period, was second only to Hood. 

Hook was sent to Harrow to be educated. When only seventeen, he made his debut 
as a dramatic author in the comic opera of The Soldier's Return, which met with ex- 
traordinary success. This was followed, the next year, by the musical farce, Catch 
Him Who Can. His brother had entered him at Oxford, but young Hook, now the 
lion of the stage, remained in London. 

His brilliant talents, especially as an improvisatore, attracted universal attention 
and won the favor of the Regent, who appointed him Accountant-General of Mauri- 
tius, with a salary of £2000. This position Hook held six years, until 1818, when a 
deficit was discovered in his accounts, and he was arrested and imprisoned. It is now 
generally agreed that his only culpability was a gross neglect of official duties. Dur- 
ing the two years of his imprisonment, and afterwards, he gave himself up with re- 
newed energy to writing. 

He wrote, in all, thirty-eight works and pieces, besides editing The John Bull and 
The New Monthly, and contributing lo other periodicals. One of his stories, Gilbert 
Gurney, is almost an autobiography. With regard to Hook's permanent value as an 
author, critics differ, as may be seen from the following quotations : 

" His knowledge of city life in its manners, habits, and language seemed intuitive, 



THE POETS. 451 

and has been surpassed only by Fielding and Dickens. Many and multifarious, how- 
ever, as are his volumes, he has left behind him no great creation, nothing that can 
be pointed to as a triumphant index of the extraordinarj' powers which he undoubt- 
edly possessed." — D. M. Moir. 

" His name will be preserved. His political songs and jeux cVe^prit, when the hour 
comes for collecting them, will form a volume of sterling and lasting attraction ; and 
after many clever romances of this age shall have sufficiently occupied public atten- 
tion, and sunk, like hundreds of former generations, into utter oblivion, there are 
tales in his collection which will be read with, we venture to think, even a greater 
interest than they commanded in their novelty." — J. G. Lockhart. 

Montgomery. 

James Moxtgomery, 1771-1854, holds a high rank among the 
poets of England. His devotional poetry especially has made a deep 
impression on the national heart, hardly inferior to that produced by 
the poetry of Cowper. 

Montgomery was a native of Scotland. He was for more than thirty j-ears editor 
of the Sheffield Iris, a liberal journal. In his capacity as editor, he was twice fined 
and imprisoned for seditious publications. The last twenty j-ears of his life were 
passed in retirement. 

Montgomery is one among the instances in which Jeffrey made shipwreck in attempt- 
ing to criticize poetical productions. The slashing reviewer broke the staff over 
Montgomery's Wanderer in Switzerland, but all in vain. Despite the maledictions 
and prognostications of the Edinburgh, Montgomery's poems gained steadily in favor, 
until the poet obtained his just rank by the side of Campbell, Rogers, and Soutbey. 

Montgomery's larger works are : The Wanderer in Switzerland ; The West Indies, a 
poem against the slave-trade; The World before the Flood; Greenland; The Pelican 
Island. Besides these, he wrote a large number of short devotional pieces that have 
been adopted into the hymnology of all Christian denominations. Many lines and 
passages, such as " There is a land, of every land the pride, " have passed into the 
common stock of the language. 

" With the exception, perhaps, of Moore, Campbell, and Hemans, I doubt if an equal 
number of the lyrics of any modern poet have so completely found their way to the 
national heart, there to be enshrined in hallowed remembrance. One great merit 
wiiich may be claimed for James Montgomery is that he has encroached on no man's 
property as a poet: he has staked off a portion of the great common of literature for 
himself, and cultivated it according to his own taste and fancy." — Moir. 

Egbert Montgomery, 1807-1856, is the author of a large number 
of works, chiefly poetical, on religious subjects. 

Robert Montgomery was a native of England. He graduated at Oxford, and took 
orders in the Established Church. He enjoyed great temporary' popularity as a poet, 
but is at present little read. His principal works are: The Omnipresence of the 
Deity ; Satan, or Intellect without God: The Messiah. Satan and The Omnipresence 
of the Deity were the subjects of a scathing notice by Macaulay in the Kdinburgh 
Review. It cannot be donbted that Montgomery lia.s committed in his poetry grievous 
violations of all the canons of good taste, and even of good sense. 



452 WORDSWORTH HIS CO XTE M POR A RI ES . 

Bernard Bartox, 1784-1849, is commonly known as " The Qua- 
ker Poet." 

He became a bankers clerk at the age of twenty-six, and continued in that posi- 
tion, like Lamb in tiie East India House, to the end of his life. He published no one 
extended poem, but a large number of detached pieces, mostly of a meditative charac- 
ter. " His works are full of passages of natural tenderness, and his religious poems, 
though animated with a warmth of devotion, are still expressed with that .«ubdu<-d 
propriety of language which evinces at ouce a correctness of taste and feeling."' — 
Geutleinan's Magazine. 

Thomas Haynes Bayly, 1797-1839, is widely known as a proliiic 
writer of novels, tales, play.s, and songs. 

His chief publications .were the following: Aylmers, a Novel ; Rough Sketches of 
Bath; Kindness in Women ; Weeds and Witchery, Poems; Poetical Works, with Life, 
published after his death. He produced also thirty-six pieces for the stage, and his 
songs are numbered by the hundred. Many of his sungs are universal favorites, sucJi 
as I'd be a Butterfly, Why Dont the Men Propose? The Soldier's Tear, etc. "He 
possessed a playful fancy, a practised ear, a refined taste, and a sentiment whicli 
ranged pleasantly from the fixuciful to the pathetic, without, however, strictly attain- 
ing either the highly imaginative or the deeply passionate."' — Moir. 

William Motherwell, 1797-1835, a native of Scotland, and 
editor of several periodicals of that country, is chiefly known for his 
Minstrelsy Ancient and Modern, with Notes and Introduction, and his 
Narrative and Lyrical Poems, a collection of original j)ieces. 

"He -was about equally successful in two deimrtments, — the martial and the plain- 
tive; yet, stirring as are his Sword Chant and his Battle-Flag of Sigurd, I doubt much 
whether they are entitled to the same praise, or have gained the same deserved accept- 
ance, as his Jeannie Morrison or his striking stanzas commencing My Heid is like to 
rend. . . . Several of his lyrics also verge on excellence; but it must lie acknowledged 
of his poetry generally that, ingenious although it be, it rather excites expectation 
than fairly satisfies." — Moir. 

WiXTHROP INIackworth Praed, 1802-1839, holds a respectable 
position among the poets of this period. 

lie was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and rose to some distinction in Parlia- 
ment as a zealous conservative. He contributed numerous short poems to the maga- 
zines. Many of his earlier productions appeared in The Etonian. While at the Uni- 
versity he gained two prizes by his poems Australia and Athens. A complete edition 
of his poetical works was published in 1S64:. Among his best known pieces are Tlie 
Belle of the Ball-Room, The Bachelor, Time's Changes, Lillian, etc. Praed is one of 
a not very numerous class of authors in England — the writers of so-called society 
verses. 

" Praed's fancy was airy, bright, and arabesque. It enabled him, ^vith his easy com- 
mand of poetical expression, to produce picturesque sketches with equal grace and 
facility. . . • His prose is almost as quaintly and pensively playful as his verse. We 



THE POETS. 453 

have little doubt that if his correspondence were selected from, it would display all 
those qualities that sparkle so gracefully in his published pieces." — Lon. Athen. 

Clare. 
John Clare, 1793-1864, is one of the peasant-poets of England. 

Clare obtained some little education by extra work as a ploughboy, — the labor of 
eight weeks sufficing to gain for him one month's schooling. At the age of thirteen, 
he met with Thomson's Seasons, a book which seems to have a special aptitude for 
imparting inspiration to the lowly. Having hoarded up a shilling wherewith to pur- 
chase a copy, he walked seven miles in the early spring morning to the town to buy a 
copy, and reached the place before the shops were open. Returning with his treasure 
through the beautiful scenery of a neighboring park, he composed on the road his 
first poem. The Morning Walk. This was followed by the Evening Walk. Most of 
his poems were composed in this way, out in the open fields, or on the roadside, and 
were w^ritten in pencil on the top of his hat. 

A volume of Poems Descriptive of Country Life appeared in 1820, and another vol- 
ume in 1821, The Village Minstrel and Other Poems. The reviews and magazines 
were unanimous in commendation of his verses, and several of the nobility were so far 
interested in his history as to contribute sums which gave him a permanent allow- 
ance of £30 a year. This, with what he raised from his two books, made quite a snug 
little fortune. He married his " Patty of the Vale," the heroine of his poetical inspi- 
rations, and settled down in calm and pleasant content amid the rural scenes of his 
boyhood. But his good fortune at last turned his head. He engaged in some pecuni- 
ary speculation, which proved disastrous, and his misfortunes finally drove him to the 
mad-house, where he died. 

" He was a faithful painter of rustic scenes and occupations, and he noted every 
light and shade of his brooks, meadows, and green lanes. His fancy was buoj-ant in 
the midst of labors and hardship; and his imagery, drawn directly from nature, is 
various and original. His reading, before his first publication, had been extremely 
limited, and did not either frame his tastes or bias the direction of his poems. He 
wrote out of the fulness of his heart; and his love of nature was so universal, that he 
included all, weeds as well as flowers, in his picturescjue catalogue of her charms." — 
Chambers. 

The following extract gives a good idea of his style : 

THE THRUSH'S NEST— A SONNET. 
" Within a thick and spreading hawthorn bush 

That overhung a molehill large and round, 
I heard from morn to morn a merry thrush 

Sing hymns of rapture, while I drank the sound 
With joy — and oft an unintruding guest, 

I watched her secret toils from day to day ; 
How true she warped the moss to form her nest, 

And modelled it within with wood and clay. 
And by and by, like heath-bells gilt with dew, 

There lay her shining eggs as bright as flowers, 
Ink-spotted over, shells of green and blue : 

And there I witnessed, in the summer hours, 
A brood of nature's minstrels chirp and fly. 
Glad as the sunshine and the laughing sky." 



454 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

II. WRITERS OF NOVELS AND TALES. 

Miss Mitford. 

Mary Russell Mitford, 1786-1855, is among the best writers 
of tales descriptive of English country life and character. 

Miss Mitford was the daughter of an English physician of extrava- 
gant habits, who dissipated several fortunes, and finally became a help- 
less burden upon the hands of his young daughter. 

Miss Mitford evinced early in life a fondness for letters. Poetry was her favorite, 
but slie was forced, as she herself narrates, to turn aside to the cvery-day but more 
lucrative path of prose. Her earlier works are not without their merits, but chiefly 
as indicating her future excellence. 

Publications. — In 1819 appeared, in the Lady's Magazine, Our Tillage, a series 
of delightful sketches of English rural life, which met with a very warm reception 
and estaljlished the author's reputation. Between this time aud 1828, Miss Mitford 
published several tragedies, which were acted with success. Among them were: 
Rietizi, The Foscari, Julian. Also a volume of Sonnets and Poems. These were fol- 
lowed by American Tales ; American Tales for Children ; Belford Regis, or Sketches 
of a Country Town ; Country Stories; and Atherton, a tale of Country Life. Upon the 
whole. Miss Mitford succeeds best as a describer of English country life and character. 
Her sketches are drawn from nature itself, and have an air of the most charming 
reality. No books of the kind are more thoroughly enjoyable by old and young. They 
have outlived nearly all the fashionable hovels, their great contemporaries, and en- 
tered into the permanent treasure-house of English literature. 

Amelia Opie. 

Amelia Opie, 1769-1853, is widely known — almost as widely as 
Miss Edgeworth — for her popular Tales. 

Mrs. Opie was the daughter of James Alderson, an English physician. She was 
married, in 1798, to the distinguished painter, James Opie. 

Her principal works are Father and Daughter, Adeline Mowbray, and Madeline. 
She wrote also a collection of shorter pieces, prominent among which are The Black 
Velvet Pelisse and The Ruffian Boy, and a series of stories to illustrate the evil con- 
sequences of lying. Her occasional poems are but little read. 

Mrs. Opie's fame as a novelist has diminished considerably of late years. In no 
sense can she be considered a creator of character. Her personages are not marked, 
the plot of the story is weak, and the moral purpose throughout is too palpable. 
Her strength lies in. her power to dissect morbid conditions aud passions of the human 
heart. 

Lady Morgan. 

Lady Sydney Morgan, 1789-1859, was in her day one of the 
leading celebrities of the literary world. She was chiefly known by 
her novels and her works of travel. 



WRITEES OF NOVELS AND TALES. 455 

Lady Morgan was the daughter of Owenson, an actor at the Royal Theatre, Dublin. 
By her success as a novelist, she gained admission into fashionable society. In 1812 
she married Sir Thomas Charles Morgan. Much of Lady Morgan's married life was 
passed in travel upon the continent. 

Her published works are very numerous, chiefly novels and books of travel. The 
most popular of her novels are The "Wild Irish Girl, and O'Bonnel. Woman, or Ida of 
Athens, is noted as having furnished the occasion for one of Gifford's most ferocious 
reviews in the London Quarterly. Her two most celebrated works of travel are en- 
titled respectively France and Italy. They are still interesting, and were read with 
avidity at the time of their appearance, although Gifford kept up his fulminations 
against the authoress. 

Lady Morgan's style is sprightly, and her descriptions successful, but she was 
wholly incompetent to deal with the graver problems of life, such as she has touched 
upon in Woman. 

John Banim, 1800-1842, an Irish novelist, is celebrated for his 
vivid descriptions of peasant life in Ireland. 

His works are numerous: Tales of the O'Hara Family, 12 series ; Croppy, a Tale of 
1798; Anglo-Irish of the 19th Century ; The Denounced ; Father Connell ; Bit O'Wri- 
tin ; Boyne Water; Crohoore of the Bill-hook ; Ghost-Hunter and his Family; John 
Doe ; Mayor of Wind-Gap ; Nowlans : Smuggler. He wrote also the Tragedy of Da- 
mon and Pythias. " The Ghost-Hunter and his Family, The Mayor of Wind-Gap, and 
several other works, are proofs of Mr. Banim's remarkable talent of eliciting the in- 
terest and sympathies of his reader. Fault has been found with him on the ground 
that there is throughout the whole of his writings a sort of overstrained excitement, 
a wilful dwelling upon turbulentand unchastened passions, which, as it is a vice most 
incident to the workings of real genius, more especially of Irish genius, so perhaps 
it is one which meets with least mercy from well-behaved, prosaic people." — West- 
minster Review, 

Lady Charlotte Burt, 1775-1861, originally Campbell, of the Argyle family, was 
celebrated equally for her personal beauty and for her passion for elegant letters. 
She was ambitious also of being lady patroness to men of letters, and was one of the 
first to recognize the rising greatness of Walter Scott. She had a place in the house- 
hold of Queen Charlotte, and is the reputed authoress of The Diary Illustrative of the 
Times of George IV. The work was attributed to her ladyship by Brougham, who 
reviewed it with great severity. She published several novels : Alia Gioruata ; The 
Devoted; The Disinherited and the Ensnared; Family Records; Flirtation; Separa- 
tion. 

Ellen Pickering, 1843, was considered in her day as the head of the Circulat- 
ing Library school of novelists. The following is a list of her principal works: The 
Heiress, Agnes Searle, The Merchant's Daughter, The Squire, The Fright, The Prince 
and Pedlar, The Quiet Husband, Who Shall be Heir? The Secret Foe, The Expectant, 
and several others. She wrote also Charades for Acting, and Proverbs for Acting. 

Captain Marryat. 

Frederick Marryat, 1792-1848, captain in the Eoyal Navy, and 
an able officer as well as writer, is universally considered the best de- 
lineator of naval life and adventure. 



456 WORDSWOETH — HIS CONTE MPOPw A PwIES. 

Marryat's works, which are exceedingly numerous, are widely read in England and 
America. The principal of them are: The King's Own; The Pacha of Many Tales; 
Midshipman Easy; Japhet in Search of a Father; Peter Simple; Jacob Faithful; The 
/Phantom Ship. 

Besides his strictly nautical novels, Captain Marryat wrote several novels and 
sketches descriptive of American life in the West, such as Yalerie, and The Narrative 
of Monsieur Violet, and also A Diary in America. During the latter part of his life 
Marryat published a number of stories for the young, such as Mastermau Ready, The 
Children of the New Forest, etc. 

As a writer upon American manners. Captain Marryat, like nearly all his country- 
men of twenty or thirty years ago, is decidedly prejudiced, but is far from being the 
worst example of the class. It is only when he moves among scenes and per.>ons 
thoroughly English that he displays his jiowers to the best advantage. His descrip- 
tions of incident and character are easy and vigorous, and extremely droll. The best 
of his works is perhaps Midshipman Easy, and the description of the great triangular 
duel by the boatswain, the purser, and the midshipman is inimitable. It must be 
observed, however, that in all Marryat's works there is a slight tinge of vulgarity, 
the besetting sin of class-writers, from which his great rival, Lever, has escaped. 
Marryat has produced many fascinating novels, but he has created nothing that can 
be placed by the side of Mickey Free, or Major Monsoon. 

William Hamilton Maxwell, 1794-1850, a native of Ireland, and a graduate of 
Trinity College, Dublin, is the author of many novels and sketches, chiefly of an 
amusing character. He may be said to have started, by his Stories of Waterloo, the 
military novel, which has since proved such a rich field for subsequent writers. Ilis 
principal works are: Stories of Waterloo; Wild Sporty of the West (of Ireland); 
Life of the Duke of Wellington ; Victories of the British Army ; Adventures of Cap- 
tain 0"Sullivan ; Brj-an O'Lvnn. 

George Borrow. 

George Borrow, 1803 , is a popular English -writer and ad- 
venturer. 

Mr. Borrow was born at Norwich, England. He had a natural turn for acquiring by 
the ear a knowledge of living languages, and had in this way acquired, among other 
languages, a knowledge of that spoken by the Gypsies, and with it a great deal 
of ciu'ious information in regard to that singular people. Mr. Borrow seems to have 
been a sort of Gypsy himself, so far as an irrepressible love of wandering and adven- 
ture is concerned; and he was employed, with wonderful success, in circulating the 
Bible in Spain at a time when no other agency seemed capable of doing the work. His 
works, partly fictitious, and partly autobiographical, giving an account of his labors 
in Bible distribution and of his adventures among the Gj-psies, are exceedingly en- 
tertaining, and have been very popular. The titles of his principal works are : The 
Bible in Spain, 3 vols ; Zincali, an Account of the Gypsies in Spain, 2 vols. ; Laven- 
gro, the Scholar, the Gypsy, and the Pi'iest, 3 vols.; Romany Rye, a Sequel to Laven- 
gro ; An Autobiography. 

Mr. Borrow had the honor of being quoted in Parliament, and by no less a speaker 
than Sir Robert Peel. " Difficulties ! were they to be deterred from proceeding by 
difficulties? Let them look at Mr. Borrow; why, if he had suffered himself to be 
prevented from circulating the Bible in Spain by the difficulties he met with, he 
could never have spread such enlightenment and information through that country." 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AND SCIENCE. 457 



Charlotte Bronte and her Sisters. 

Three sisters, daughters of Rev. Patrick Bronte, rose suddenly to 
fame about the middle of the present century : Charlotte, 1816- 
1855, known as " Currer Bell ; " Anne, 1820-1849, known as " Acton 
Bell ; " and Emily, 1819-1848, known as " Ellis Bell." 

" Avei'se to personal publicity, we veiled our names under those of Currer, Acton, 
and Ellis Bell, — the ambiguous choice being dictated by a sort of conscientious 
scruple at assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to 
declare ourselves women, because — without at that time suspecting that our mode 
of wi-iting and thinking was not what is called 'feminine' — we had a vague im- 
pression that authoresses are likely to be looked upon with prejudice ; we had no- 
ticed how critics sometimes use for their chastisement the weapon of personality, 
and for their reward a flattery which is not true praise." 

The tirst publication of the sisters was a joiiit affair, Poems by Currer, Ellis, and 
Acton Bell. 

Emily, besides her share in the volume just named, wrote Wuthering Heights, a 
novel of considerable, but very unequal power. Anne wrote also Agnes Grey, and 
The Tenant of Wildfeld Hall. None of these works, probably, would have attracted 
much attention, but for their association with those of the older sister. 

Charlotte's first separate publication was Jane Eyre, an Autobiography, 1848. It 
was a work of wonderful power, and it gained immediate and universal popularity. 
It was followed, in 1819. by Shirley, not quite equal to the preceding, but still very 
able and very popular. In 1850, alter the death of her sisters, she published a Selec- 
tion of their Literary Remains, with a Biographical notice. Villette, her last and 
greatest work, came out in 1852, and was received with a universal burst of acclama- 
tion. In it she not only rose to the level of Jane Eyre, but even went above it. "No 
one in her time has grasped with such extraordinary force the scenes and circum- 
stances through which her story moved, or thrown so strong an individtial life into 
place and locality. Her passionate and fearless nature, her wild, warm heart, are 
transferred into the magic world she has created. — a world wliich no one can enter 
without yielding to the iri'esistible fascination of her personal inflaence." — 
BlacJcwood. 

About the time of the appearance of Villette, Charlotte was married to her father's 
curate, Rev. Arthur B. Nicholls, but died after a brief period of domestic happiness. 
The biography of Charlotte Bronte by Mrs. Gaskell is itself a book of intense interest, 
and is the best commentary on her novels. 

Rev. Patrick BroxtS, 1774-1861, the father of Charlotte, Anne, and Emily, pub- 
lished, in 1811, a volume. Cottage Poems. 



III. WRITERS ON LITERATURE, POLITICS, AND 

SCIENCE. 

Sydney Smith. 

Sydney Smith, 1771-1845, the witty Canon of St. Paul's, 
was on the whole the ablest and most effective of that small 
39 



458 WORDSWORTH HIS CO Js^TE MPOR ARIES . 

band of writers who in the early part of this century made 
the Edinburgh Review a power in the world. 

Sydney Smith studied at Winchester and at Oxford, took orders in 
the Church of England, and became finally Canon of St. Paul's. His 
name has become the synonym for wit and humor. It is not so gene- 
rally known, however, that his more solid qualities of judgment and 
taste were equally prominent. 

Smith's wit was of the highest order, the wit which results from a keen, intnitire 
perception of right and wrong, not degenerating into bitterness and rancor, but 
poised by strong good sense ^nd healthy self-activity. He differs from Lamb in haviug 
less humor, and a less delicate play of fancy. Lamb's whimsicalities are those of a 
recluse who lives to himself and his bool;s, and loiters through the world with half- 
closed eyes ; Smith walks briskly through the great Vanity Fair with eyes wide open 
and a jest at his tongue's end for every folly. Many of Smith's sayings and repartees 
have become proverbial, such as the one in which he characterizes Macaulay's con- 
versation as enlivened by brilliant flashes of silence. 

Sydney Smith was one of the founders of the Edinburgh Keview, and he wrote 
for that periodical many of its most brilliant articles on politics, literature, and 
philosophy. 

His most celebrated series of writings was his Letters on the Subject of the Catho- 
lics, to my Brother Abraham who lives in the Country. These Letters, appearing 
during the times of agitation which preceded the passage of the Catholic Emancipa- 
tion Bill, exhibited the author's full powers of wit, sarcasm, and solid reasoning, and 
simimed up the case for Emancipation so ably as to leave nothing to be said on the 
other side. 

SeA'erai volumes of his Sermons have been published ; they show that Smith was 
no less able as a preacher than as a writer. Many of these sermons bear directly upon 
the Emancipation controversy. 

His Letters on American Debts, written for the Morning Chronicle, were occa- 
sioned by his loss of money inA^estedin Pennsylvania State loans. Their tone is some- 
what unfair, and is deplorably bitter, the more so since Smith's loss was not heavy. 
As a matter of principle, however, the legislative repudiation of those days deserved 
all tlie scorn and denunciation that it received, 

Sydney Smith's Memoirs, published by his daughter. Lady Holland, is a most in- 
teresting biography, revealing to us both the public and domestic life of one of the 
shrewdest and most admirable of writers, husbands, and fathers. 

It may be said of Smith's wit that it is always good, and never vulgar. A collec- 
tion of his sayings has been made, under the title of Wit and Wisdom of Sydney 
Smith. Among the hundreds of brilliant remarks here brought together, there is 
not one soiled by impurity, vulgarity, or profanity. 

Lady Holland. — (Miss) Saba Smith, afterwards Lady Holland,-^- 1867, eldest 
daughter of the Rev. Sydney Smith, was married, in 1S34, to Henry Holland,who was 
physician-in-ordinary to Trince Albert and knighted in 1S53 by Queen Victoria. Lady 
Holland has won for herself a lasting name by her one work, the Memoir of her father 
Sydney Smith, one of the most delightful and best-told personal narratives in thg 
language. 



Sw 



LITERATURE^ POLITICS^ AND SCIENCE. 459 

Jeffrey. 

Francis, Lord Jeffrey, 1773—1850, made for himself a 
world-wide celebrity as a leading writer for the Edinburgh 
Review, of which also, for more than the fourth of a century, 
he was the fearless and unequalled editor. 

Jeffrey was a native of Edinburgh. He studied at the University 
of Glasgow and at Oxford, and practised law in Edinburgh, but with 
little success. While a young man in Edinburgh, he became intimate 
with Horner, Brougham, and Sydney Smith, and the result of this in- 
timacy was the establishment of the celebrated Eeview. After the 
publication of the first three numbers, the editorship was transferred 
from Smith to Jeffrey, who retained it from 1803 to 1829. 

In 1830, Jeffrey was appointed Lord Advocate. From 1831 to 1834 he sat in Parlia- 
ment. In 1834 he succeeded Lord Craigie in the Court of Sessions, thereby acquiring 
the honorary title of Lord Jeffrey. After retiring from the post of editor, he con- 
tributed only four or five more articles to the Review. 

Jeffrey's contributions number in all two hundred A selection, seventy-nine in 
number, has been published, in 4 vols., 8vo ; the remaining articles still lie scattered 
throughout the numbers of the Review. 

Jeffrey occupies undoubtedly the most prominent position among modern English 
reviewers. This prominence is due, however, fully as much to his success in editor- 
ship as to his own merits as a critic. Under his management the Edinburgh Review 
became a great literary and political power in the realm. Men of every rank and 
profession read and admired, dreaded or hated, its slashing tone and. its recklessness 
of fear or favor. Much, very much, of the political progress of England during the 
present century is due- to the stimulus applied unsparingly to the body politic by the 
•writers for this Review. 

As to Lord Jeffrey's own writings, opinions are somewhat divided. There can be 
no question concerning the vigor and elegance of his style, the purity of his motives, 
and the general soundness of his principles of criticism. In matters of poetry, how- 
ever, he made such grave blunders — failing, for instance, to appreciate the rising 
genius of poets like Scott, Byron, Coleridge, Moore, and other's — that it may be 
doubted whether he was not defective in true imagination and sympathy. On this 
point, the opinion of one who is himself a poet should be heard. " Our very ideas of 
what is poetry," says Scott, "differ so widely that we rarely talk upon the subject. 
There is something in his mode of reasoning that leads me greatly to doubt whether, 
notwithstanding the vivacity of his imagination, he really has any feeling of poetical 
genius, or whether he has worn it all off by perpetually sharpening his wit on the 
grindstone of criticism." 

Brougham. 

Henry, Lord Brougham, 1778-1868, was one of the great 
lights of the nineteenth century. He was an advocate, a 
jurist, a statesman, a political reformer, and a man of let- 



4C0 WORDSWORTH HIS CO]S'TEMPOR A RIES . 

ters, and in each of these walks of mental activity stood 
among the foremost. 

Brougham was a native of Edinh-jrgh, and was educated there in 
its High-School and its University, Among his teachers in Edin- 
burgh were men of great note, — Dr. Adam, Dugald Stewart, Playfair, 
and Black. He was of an old English family, but he intimates in his 
Autobiography that whatever genius he had came from his mother, 
who was a niece of Robertson the historian. 

Brougham gave early indications of genius, and his first efforts were 
in the direction of science. He wrote, at the age of seventeen, a paper 
on the Kefraction and Reflection of Light, which was printed in the 
Transactions of the Royal Society. Though he became a lawyer and a 
statesman, and rose to the highest professional eminence, the original 
bias and the essentially scientific character of his mind came out in 
nearly all his writings. 

As a lawyer, Brougham soon rose to distinction in London ; and being employed as 
counsel for the defence of Queen Caroline, he had an occasion for the display of his 
talents such as has rarely happened. He was for many years a member of the House 
of Commons, where he had no superior in debate, and no equal except perhaps Can- 
ning. He Avas at length elevated to the Peerage and made Lord Chancellor. One of 
his most celebrated speeches was that delivered in the House of Lords on the passage 
of the Reform Bill. As Chancellor, he displayed amazing activity, and on retiring 
from the oflBce he left not a single case in arrear of judgment, — a fact without prece- 
dent in the history of that court. His last years were spent in rural retirement, at 
Cannes, in France. 

Lord Brougham was through life an earnest advocate of popular education, cheap 
pu'iilications, and of political and social reform. He was one of the founders of the 
Society for the Diffusion of Usel'ul Knowledge, and its first chairman. He wrote for 
it a treatise on The Objects, Advantages, and Pleasures of Science. He took an active 
part also in the Social Science Association. 

Of all his labors, however, none probably produced a more immediate and wide- 
spread influence than those connected with the Edinburgh Review. This celebrated 
journal was begun in 1802 by Brougham, Jeffrey, Sydney Smith, and Horner, all young 
men. In the first 20 numbers, Horner contributed 14 articles. Smith 23, Jeffrey 75, 
Brougham 80. Brougham continued for twenty-five years to be a regular contributor 
to its pages. This Review exerted a powerful influence wherever the English lan- 
guage was spoken, and on almost every topic of public interest ; and Brougham, 
Smith, and Jeffrey were for many years the great triumvirs who wielded, without dis- 
pute, the mighty sceptre. 

A complete edition of Brougham's works was published under his own supervision, 
in 1857, in 10 vols., 8vo. Vol. 1. Lives of Philosophers of the Time of George III.; 
Vol. 2. Lives of Men of Letters, of the same time; Vols. 3, 4, 5. Sketches of Eminent 
Statesmen, of the same time; Vol. C. Natural Theology: Vol. 7. Rhetorical and Liter- 
ary Dissertations and Addresses; Vol. 8. Historical and Political Dissertations; Vols. 
9, 10. Speeches on Social and Political Subjects. Since his death, his autobiography, 
written when he was almost ninety, has made its appearance; Life and Times of 
Lord Brougham, written by himself, 3 vols. 



AND SCIENCE. 461 

Francis Horxee, 1778-1817, is known as one of the originators of 
the Edinburgh Eeview. He died comparatively young, and did not 
live to achieve that greatness to which he seemed destined. In tal- 
ents and promise he was the acknowledged compeer of Brougham and 
Jeffrey. 

Horner was a native of Ediuburgh ; he was educated at the High-School and the 
University of that city; and was elected to Parliament, where he distinguished him- 
self by his knowledge of political economy and finance. His excessive labors as a 
member of the Bullion Committee broke down his health, and led ultimately to his 
death. 

As a man of letters, Horner is chiefly known by reason of his connection with the 
Edinburgh Review, he being one of its originators and earl^^ contributors. As a 
statesman, he was, during his lifetime, the most conspicuous member of the then 
rising Whig party, and as much loved for his moral qualities as he was respected for 
his intellectual. Nothing but his early death prevented hitn from rising to the high- 
est political eminence. 

" He died at the age of thirtj'-eight ; possessed of greater public influence than any 
other private man, and admired, trusted, beloved, and deplored by all except the 
heartless or the base. No greater homage was ever paid in Parliament to any deceased 
member." — Lord CocJcburn. 

\A/ilson. 

John Wilson, 1785-1854, better known as Christopher 
North, did for Blackwood's Magazine what Brougham, Jef- 
frey, and Smith did for the Edinburgh Review. He was 
equally, though somewhat later, and in a difierent way, a 
potentate in the world of opinion. 

Wilson was the son of a wealthy manufacturer of Paisley. His 
studies were finished at the University of Glasgow and at Oxford, 
where he earned great reputation both as an athlete and a scholar. 
Left by the death of his father in possession of a handsome fortune, 
he purchased a fine estate in Cumberland, and enjoyed for many years 
the society of the so-called lake j^oets. 

In 1812, Wilson published his poem, The Isle of Palms, and, in 1816, Tbe City of the 
Plague. In 1815, having lost much of his property by the mismanagement of a rela- 
tive, he returned to Scotland, settled in Edinburgh, and began the practice of the 
law. It is not probable, however, that he would in any case have gained glory at the 
bar. What decided his career, however, was the starting of Blackwood's Magazine 
in 1817. Tlie publisher recognized immediately the talents of Wilson and of Lock- 
hart, and tlicy became the life of the magazine. After Lockhart's removal to London 
to take charge of the Quarterly Review, Wilson became the sole editor in fact, al- 
though Blackwosd always exercised a decided and direct control as publisher and 
nominal editor. 

In 1820 Wilson was elected Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of 
39* 



462 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Edinburgh. His competitor was Sir William Hamilton, then, however, but little 
known. "VYilson succeeded in sustaining both liis editorship and his professorship 
with great distinction. Although neither original nor profound as a thinker, he was 
eminently successful in stimulating and interesting his pupils. 

Aside from his contributions to the Magazine, he published Lights and Shadows of 
Scottish Life, The Trial of Margaret Ljndsay, and The Foresters. The principal col- 
lections of his magazine pieces are to be found in The Critical and MisceUaneous 
Articles of Christopher North, The Recreations of Christopher North, and the Noctes 
Ambrosianae. 

It can scarcely be doubted that Wilson possessed poetic talents, but whether he was 
really a poet remains undecided. In the press of his duties as professor and constant 
contributor, his aim was too much distracted to permit him to ripen into a decided 
poet. His genius shone brightest when writing those genial, hap-hazard, yet emi- 
nently suggestive sketches, criticisms, and fragments that filled page after page of 
Blackwood, and kept the reader laughing or i'rowning, but always awake. There was 
a spontaneity, a freshness, about North's utterances, a freedom from conventionality, 
that surprised and delighted. 

After all, however, there is ground for believing that North was greater than his 
works. The historian or the critic encounters, from time to time, a hero or an author 
who occupies an exalted position, and yet who has left no record or monument which, 
considered in itself alone, Avould justify such exaltation. Ihe explanation is to be 
looked for in the impression which the presence and character of the man himself made 
upon his friends, and which they have communicated to the nation at large. Horner 
is an instance, and Wilson is another. They are men of capabilities, of potentialities 
rather than of realities. There is a something about their name and bearing which 
suggests that tliej' may do, or might have done, far beyond what they ever have done. 

Thus it is that we must explain the phenomena of North's record in Scotch liter- 
ature. The popular heart has always associated him with Burns and Scott, as one of 
a great literary trio. To the Scotch mind, the massive form, shaggy brows, rollicking 
manner, shrewd bonhomie, independent speech of the great Kit North, are typical 
of national character. He is a man whom his countrymen thoroughly understand, 
and with whom they can sympathize. 

James Wilson, 1795-1856, brother of "Christopher North" (Prof. 
John Wilson), was born at Paisley, Scotland. He began the study 
of the law, but soon relinquished it, and taking to himself a wife, and 
a pretty little cottage near Edinburgh, gave himself up to the life of a 
naturalist. 

Wilson's contributions on natural history have all the grace and beauty of those of 
the American ornithologists, Wilson and Audubon, and of other great naturalists who 
have studied Nature Avith the imagination of a poet and the fondness of a lover. He 
published Illustrations of Zoology, being representations of new, rare, or otherwise 
remarkable subjects of the animal kingdom, drawn and colored after nature, with de- 
scriptive letter-press ; with .lames Duncan, Entomologia Edinensis, a description and 
history of the insects found in the neighborhood of Edinburgh ; A Treatise on Insects ; 
The Natural History of Quadrupeds and Whales ; The Natural History of Fishes ; The 
Natural History of Birds ; The Rod and the Gun, two treatises on Angling and Shoot- 
ing; A Voyage round the Coasts of Scotland and the Isles. Mr. Wilson contributed 
also most of the articles on natural history in the Encyclopedia Britannica. 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AND SCIENCE. 463 

Henrietta "Wilson, 18G2, a niece of Prof. John Wilson, wrote Little Things, 

and the Chronicles of a Garden, its Pets and its Pleasures. 



De Quincey. 

Thomas De Quincey, 1785-1859, is familiarly known as 
the English Opium Eater. Although in the main he made 
shipwreck of his wonderful powers, he yet achieved much 
that was great and noble. He is by common consent one of 
the greatest masters of English prose. 

Career. — De Quincey was born near Manchester, the son of a rich 
merchant. He spent his earliest years in rustic solitude, and after- 
wards, according to his own expression, " his infant feelings were 
moulded by the gentlest of sisters, instead of horrid pugilistic brothers." 
At twelve he was sent to a public grammar-school. His proficiency 
there in classical studies approached the marvellous. At the age of 
seventeen, he ran away from school, took a tour on foot through Wales, 
and went thence to London, resolving to escape if possible the knowl- 
edge and control of his guardians. He led for several months a life 
of wild adventure in London, being often in abject poverty. The fol- 
lowing year he entered Oxford, where he remained live years, and 
where, unfortunately, he contracted the habit of eating opium, which 
exerted such a baleful influence on his subsequent career. 

After leaving the University, when about the age of twenty-four, he 
became intimate with Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Southey, and took 
up his abode among them at Grasmere, in the beautiful Lake region 
made famous by the residence of these great Avriters. He remained in 
that place about twenty years, devoting his time to literary pursuits, 
and publishing his writings through the magazines, — Blackwood, Tait, 
and others. 

After indulging in the excessive nse of opium for many years, he at last, by a des- 
perate and long-continued effort, succeeded in overcoming the habit, though he never 
recovered entirely froni the terrible effects. This was in 1S2'\ when he was thirty-five 
years of age. In the following year ho made a great sensation by the publication of 
The Confessions of an English Opium Eater, giving an account of his previous life and 
of his experience under the influence of the dreadful drug. 

After leaving Grasmere, he went to Glasgow and thence to Edinburgh, in which 
latter city he spent the last years of his life. He lived to the age of seventy-four. 

De Quincey was a man of extraordinary powers, and had they been under proper 
regulation, he might have achieved woi'ks which would have placed him among the 
great men of all time. As it is, his works are all of the nature of fragments, great 
and splendid, beyond the reach of any man of his time to equal, yet, after all, frag- 
ments. He projected a great work, De Emcudationo Humani Intcllectus (On the Im- 



4G4 WORDSWORTH — HIS COXTEMPOR A RIES . 

provement of the Human Infellect), which might have been a companion to the Xo- 
vum Organum of Bacon, if lie had had the method and the persidtence of will to carry 
the work to completion. " He never finished anything except his sentences, which are 
models of elaborate workmanship." — Londmi Quarterly. 

Of the excellence of his style, as a writer of prose, it is diflBcult to speak too highly. 
Not a few critics of great authority place him, in that respect, at the head of all 
English prose writers, while others divide the honor between him and Ruskin. His 
pre-eminent abilities seem to have met their full recognition first in the United States; 
and to Ticknor & Fields, of Boston, belongs the honor of bringing out the first com- 
plete edition of his works. That edition is in 20 vols., l-'mo. 

He wrote on a great variety of subjects, historical, literary, speculative, imagina- 
tive ; and on every subject that he undertook he left the evidences of great and orig- 
inal genius. " The authors about whom he has written most are Milton, Pope, Words- 
worth, and Coleridge. Of the first, third, and fourth, he was a devoted admirer and 
champion. But the second [Pope] seemed to him the very incarnation of the worst 
epoch of our literature." — London Quarterly. 

De Quincey, like Coleridge, had a wonderful power in conversation. A visitor thus 
describes his talk : " For a half hour at least he talked as we have never heard another 
talk. We have listened to Sir William Hamilton at his own fireside, to Carlyle, 
walking in the parks of London, to Lamartine in the midst of a favored few at his 
own house, to Cousin at the Sorbonne, and to many others, but never have we heard 
such sweet music of eloquent speech as then flowed from De Quincey's tongue. To 
attempt reporting what he said would be like attempting to entrap the rays of the 
sun. Strange light beamed from that grief-worn face, and for a little while that weak 
body, so long fed upon by pain, seemed to be clothed upon with supernatural 
youth." 

Loekhart. 

John Gibson Loekhart, 1794-1854, occupies a large and 
honorable place in the literary history of his times. 

Career. — Lockliart was a native of Scotland. He was educated at 
Glasgow and Oxford, and married the eldest daughter of Sir AValter 
Scott. He was one of the early contributors to Blackwood's Magazine, 
and from 1826 to 1853 was editor of the London Quarterly Beview, 
succeeding Giiford, the well-known "slasher" of young poets. 

In his position as editor, Lockliart placed the Quarterly in the very first rank of 
periodicals, and restored to it the wide range of sympathy and culture which it had 
lost under Gifford's administration. Besides his editorial labors and his numerous and 
still uncollected contributions to the Quarterly, to Blackwood, and to other magazines, 
Loekhart is the author of a number of independent works. 

Prominent among his works are the following: Reginald Dalton, a Novel, being a 
Story of English University Life; JJatthew Wald. also a Xovel ; the Life of Burns, 
written with great understanding of the poet's character and talents; a Life of Na- 
poleon; and a volume of Translations of Ancient Spanish Ballads. Tliis work is well 
known to every lover of ballad literature and warmly praised by critics of every 
country. Loekhart is at once a faithful and a spirited translator; in some instances, 
indeed, he has even improved slightly upon the imperfect original. 

Lockhart's great work is his Memoirs of Sir Walter Scott, which, as a biography, 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AIs^D SCIENCE. 465 

ranks next to Boswell's Life of Johnson. The chief merit of this biography, aside 
from the light which it throws upon the life of the celebrated novelist, is the warm 
spirit of devotion by which it is pervaded. Lockhart, like Boswell, is completely 
given up to his theme, and his owa enthusiasm kindles the heart of the reader. As 
Prescott has happily expressed it: " Fortunate as Sir Walter Scottwas in his life, it was 
not the least of his good fortune that he left the task of recording it to one so 
competent." 

Landor. 

Walter Savage Laxdor, 1775-1864, is one of the connecting 
links between the age of Walter Scott, Byron, and Southev, and that of 
Tennyson and Dickens. He began writing while still a boy, and he did 
not cease entirely until extreme old age, though he lived to be almost 
ninety. 

Landor was educated at Rugby and Oxford, and was remarkable for the accuracy 
of his scholarship in Latin and Greek, and for his knowledge of history, and especially 
of the history of Greece and Rome. The men and the affairs of former ages seemed to 
be as familiar to his mind, in all the minutiae of their every-day and private life, as 
are those of our own personal acquaintance. This thoroughness of historical knowl- 
edge, joined to a vigorous imagination, enabled him to execute in so wonderful a 
manner those Imaginary Conversations, which form the enduring basis of his fame. 

In these Conversations, after the manner of Plato and Cicero, he introduces well- 
known historical characters, as discussing various questions of public and private 
interest. The range of subjects discussed in these dialogues is almost encyclopaedic 
in character, in accordance with the character of the autiior's mind, and the proprie- 
ties of time and person are so nicely observed that the reader almost unconsciously 
becomes acquainted with the men as well as with the subjects. 

In this class of his works are to be included Imaginary Conversations of Greeks and 
Romans, 2 vols.; Imaginary Conversations of Literary Men and Statesmen, 2 vols. ; 
Pericles and Aspasia, 2 vols. ; and perhaps Citation and Examination of Shakespeare 
for Deer-stealing. 

Landor published several poems, some of which enjoyed much popularity, though 
all gave evidence of power. Gebir, one of his earliest, he translated into Latin, 
and Jeffrey declared it to be equally unintelligible in both languages, while Southey 
claimed to be the only person who had read it, until he discovered that the same feat 
had been accomplished by De Quincey. Some of Landor's other poems are Count Ju- 
lian, a Tragedy ; Andria of Hungary, and Giovanni of Naples, Dramas ; Hellenics, etc. 

Mr. Landor was a man of wealth, extremely fastidious in his tastes, proud even to 
arrogance, careless, almost contemptuous, of public opinion, and not condescending to 
conceal the good opinion he had of himself. He was of course unpopular, and was 
subjected to savage criticismr. Yet, as years rolled on, his eminent merits gradually 
obtained recognition ; and, unlike many of his contemporaries, his star now stands con- 
fessedly higher in the firmament than it did fifty years ago. His writings are very un- 
equal, and some of them doubtless deserve the condemnation wliich they received. 
But others are truly classical, and may claim to stand beside the famous works of an- 
tiquity which they most resemble in form and structure. 

Mr. Landor in 1806 sold his large estates and left England in disgust. He served in 
the Spanish army, against Napoleon, from 1808 to 1814. In 1816 he became a resident 
of Florence, and died there in 1864, having visited England however at intervals 
meanwhile. 

2E 



466 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES, 



Leigh Hunt. 

James Henry Leigh Huxt, 1784-1859, was one of the leading 
literary men of this period. 

Hunt was born at Southgate, near London, and educated at Christ Hospital, where 
Lamb and Coleridge also received their schoojing. He began at a very earl^' age the 
life of a man of letters. In 18u8, in company with his brother John, he edited The 
Examiner. In 1812, both brothers were fined and imprisoned because of a satire upon 
the Prince Regent. From 1S18 to 1822 he edited The Indicator, and in 1822, in con- 
junction with Byion and Shelley, The Liberal. He also edited The Companion and 
The London Journal, besides contributing profusely to many other periodicals, and 
publishing a number of independent works and translations. 

Hunt is not without some merit as a poet. His Rimini and his translations of 
Reili"s Bacchus in Tuscany and Tasso"s Amyntas have been highly' praised. It is as 
a writer of easy, entertaining prose, however, that Leitih Hunt is and will be best 
known. jS'ot the least interesting of his prose works is his Autobiography. 

"His style, in spite of its mannerism, nay, partly by reason of its mannerism, is 
well suited for light garrulous, desultory ana, half-critical, half-biographical. We do 
not always agree with his literary judgments ; but we find in him what is very rare 
in our time, — the power of justly appreciating and heartily enjoying good things of 
very different kinds." — Macaulay. 



John Foster. 

John Foster, 1770-1843, was the son of a weaver, and was him- 
self apprenticed to a trade ; but discovering aptitudes for higher occu- 
pations, he was allowed to study for the ministry, and entered the Bap- 
tist College at Bristol. 

Foster was ordained, and exercised his ministry among the Baptists in different 
places, but was obliged by a glandulous affection of the neck to stop preaching. He 
gave himself up. after this, to literary work, writing chiefly for the Eclectic RevieAV. 
His contributions to this Review rank with those of ]Macaulay, Jeffrey, and Mackin- 
tosh in tlie Edinburgh, for vigor, originality, depth, and finish. He wrote also a series 
of Essays, which are known wherever the English language is spoken. 

His publications are : Lectures at Broadmead Chapel ; Contributions, Biographical. 
Literary, and Philosophical, to the Eclectic Review : Essays. The Essays are on the fol- 
lowing subjects : 1. On a Man's Writing Memoirs of Himself ; 2. On Decision of Charac- 
ter; 3. On the Application of the Epithet Romantic; 4. On Some of the Causes by which 
Evangelical Religion has been rendered Less Acceptable to Persons of Cultivated 
Taste; 3. On the Evils of Popular Ignorance; and 6. On the Communication of the 
Gospel to the People of India; Introductory Essay to Doddridge's Rise and Progress 

" In simplicity of language, in majesty of conception, in the eloquence of that con- 
ciseness which conveys, in a short sentence, more meaning than the mind dares at 
once admit, his writings are unmatched."' — North British Review. 

'"The author places the idea which he wishes to present in such a flood of light, 
that it is not only visible itself, but it seems to illumine all around it. He paints 
metaphysics, and has the happy art of arraying what in other hands would appear 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AND SCIENCE. 467 

cold and comfortless abstractions, in the warmest colors of fanc}'. "Witliout quitting 
his argument in pursuit of ornament or imagery, his imagination becomes the perfect 
handmaid of his reason, ready at any moment to spread his canvas and present his 
pencil." — Robert Hall. 

Kallam. 

Hexry Hallam, LL.D., 1778-1859, educated at Eton and Oxford, 
was one of the most distinguished historical writers of the century. 

Hallam's chief writings are: Tiew of Europe during the Middle Ages, 3 vols., 8vo ; 
Constitutional History of England, 3 vols., Svo ; Literature of Europe in l-5-17th cen- 
turies, 3 vols., Svo. Hallam was a valued friend of Sir "Walter Scott, and one of the 
early contributors to the Edinburgh Review. He was also associated with T\"ilber- 
force in the suppression of the slave-trade. Hallam's works are so well known that it 
is scarcely necessary to do more than allude to them here. They are characteiized 
by every feature that should mark the historian, — accuracy of research, breadth of 
view, elegance of style. They are to be regarded as marking a new ei'a in the study 
of the Middle Ages and of constitutional history. 

"Mr. Hallam is, on the whole, far better qualified than any other writer of our 
time for tbe ofiBce which he has undertaken. He has great industry and great acute- 
ness. His knowledge is extensive, various, and profound. His mind is equally dis- 
tinguished by the amplitude of its grasp, and by the delicacy of its tact. . . . His 
work is eminently judicial. Its spirit is that of the bench, not that of the bar.'" — 
Macavlay. 

Arthttr Henry Hall.\m, 1S"11-1833, son of the distinguished historian Henry Hal- 
lam, is chiefly known from being the subject of Tennyson's celebrated poem In Memn- 
riam. Young Hallam appears to have been a man of extraordinary promise. His 
Literary Remains were published in 1834, for private distribution. 

Maginn. 

AYiLLiAM Maginx, LL. D., 1794-1842, a native of Ireland, and a 
graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, removed to London, in 1823, and 
there devoted himself for the remainder of his life to writing for the 
periodic press. 

"Dr. Maginn contributed to many of the reviews, but principally to Bbickwood's 
Magazine and to Frazer"s. of which latter he was one of the originatoi-s. He Wiis the 
famous Sir Morgan O'Doherty of Blackwood's. Maginn's wit, humor, and eccentricity 
gained for him the sobriquet of the modern Rabelais. 

At a time when magazine writing was in its prime. Dr. Maginn was its acknowledged 
leading star. His prominent feature was versatility ; he wrote, and wrote well, on all 
.subjects, humorous, critical, historical, classical, in a .style suited to each. "One of 
the most remarkable of that group of scholars and good fellows, ready writers, boon 
companions, and wits, who initiated the brilliant periodical literature of this age in the 
British islands, was "William .Maginn, LL. D., the youngest doctor of laws ever graduated 
at Old Trinity. . . Every English periodical of mark for yeai-s owed somewhat of its in- 
fluence and its interest to the prompt, copious, erudite, and funny pen of ^laginn. Now 
it was a parody, and now a translation ; to-day a critique, to-morrow a letter from 
Paris; one month a novel, and the next a po.liticil tN'^say. Verssitile, learned, apt, aud 



468 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

facile, the genial Irish doctor made wisdom and mirth wherever he went. Too con- 
vivial for bis own good, too improvident for his prosperity, he was yet a benefactor to 
the public, a delight to scholars, and an idol to his friends " — Tuckerman. 

The service which Maginn's countrymen failed to render to him has been rendered 
by an American, R, Shelton Mackenzie, LL. D , who published, in 185'>, 5 vols, of 
Maginn's Miscellanies. These represent the cream of Maginn's writings, scattered 
before that time through the pages of reviews and magazines. They are carefiiUy 
edited with notes. The work is worthy alike of the author and of the editor. 

Mahony — Father Prout. 

Eev. Francis Mahony, 1800 , is especially known in litera- 

tnre by a series of papers published in Frazer's Magazine, under the 
name of Father Prout. 

Mahony was born in Ireland, and was educated for the priesthood in the Catholic 
Church, but seems to have devoted himself to literary pursuits. lie was one of that 
baud of scholarly and witty Irishmen who rallied around Maginn in the palmy days 
of Frazer's Magazine. Mahony was for a time one of the editors of the London Globe, 
and Roman Correspondent of the Daily News, but acquired his chief reputation by the 
series of humorous pieces in Frazer's Magazine, already named, and purporting to be 
written by " Father Prout." These were republished in book form, as The Reliques 
of Father Prout, 2 vols., with illustrations by Maclise. 

Mahony wrote also Facts and Figures from Italy, by Don Jeremy Savonarola. 
He is said to have been the author of a remarkable piece of fun which appeared in 
Blackwood, called Father Tom and the Pope, but that is by no means certain. The 
" Prout " papers have not the broad fun of " Father Tom and the Pope," but abound 
in scholarly wit of a more quiet kind. In one of these papers, the author gives The 
Groves of Blarney in five different versions, in parallel columns, English, Fi-ench, 
Italian, Latin, and Greek, all maintaining the metre of the original "Corcagian," and 
all rhyming. The reader has but to imagine such rollicking verses as those in tlie 
subjoined extract, put into rhyming Greek, of like structure, to understand the ex- 
quisite humor of the whole affair. 

THE BLARNEY-STONE. 'O BAapt'tKos Aides' 

There is a stone there, Exei \i.6ov t cvpyjo-et?, 

That whoever kisses, Avtov n-ev ei (^tArjo-eij, 

Oh ! he never misses 'Ev^aijxov to <^tArj/u,a* 

To become eloquent. Ptjtoup yap Trapaxprjua. 

'Tis he may clamber TevrjaeaL av Setvos, 

To a lady's chamber, Tvvai^i t epareivos* 

Or become a member lefxyoTaTo. re \a\u)v 

Of Parliament : Ei^ ^ovKr] twv ixst aXAwv, 

A clever spouter, Kal ev rais a-yopaicrt 

He '11 sure tarn out, or " KaSoAi/cat? " /Soaicrt 

An out-and-outer, Atj/hos troi 'KoXovOrjcret., 

To be let alone ; Kat ^eipas croi KpoT-qaeL 

Don't hope to hinder him, 'fi? avSpi tw /Meyia-TU), 

Or to bewilder him ; Arj.aoyopojj' t apto-roj* 

Sure he 's a pilgrim fi 'oSo; ovpavovSe 

From the Blarney-Stone ! Aia BXappLKov KtOov y r] ! 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AND SCIENCE. 4G9 

Some of Mahony's Latin facetiae, in the repartees attributed to Erasmus and Sir 
Thomas More, have a like flavor. When More, on one occasion, badgered Erasmus 
about his name, in the following punning hexameter, 

Quaeritur unde tibi sit nomen, Erasmus? — Eras mus? 
The Avitty Latinist instantly replied, in a no less sparkling- pentameter, 

Si sum mus ego, te judice summus ero ! 

As a further punishment, Erasmus, with a sly pun, understood only by the initiated, 

dedicated to More the Mtopta? EyKajjutop- Father Prout quotes another Latin pun 

of Erasmus, upon the clergy, in a dialogue between himself and Echo: 

(Erasmus loquitur) — Quid est Sacerdotium ? 

(Echo respoudit) — Otium ! 

Horace and James Smith. 

Horace Smith, 1779-1849, and James Smith, 1775-1839, two 
brothers, natives of London, were celebrated as wits and writers. 

Their contributions first appeared in The Picnic, the London Review, and the 
Monthly Mirror. 

In 1812, on the occasion of the offering of a prize at the opening of the new Drury 
Lane Theatre, they brought out their celebrated Pi ejected Addresses. These Imagin- 
ary competitive and unsuccessful prize poems were happy imitations of Scott, Byron, 
Wordsworth, Coleridge, and all the leading poets of the day. The volume was pub- 
lished anonymously, but soon became the town-talk. Even the poets themselves 
seem to have taken the joke in good part. Jeffrey pronounced the Rejected Addresses 
" to be the very best imitations (nnd often of difiicult originals) that were ever made, 
and, considei'ing their great extent and variety, to indicate a talent to which I do not 
know where to look for a parallel." These Rejected Addresses now form an import- 
ant volume in the library of standard English humor. 

Nothing that the Smith brothers published subsequently wa? at all equal to the 
work just named. Horace Smith wrote numerous novels in unsuccessful imitation 
of Walter Scott — the best of which, perhaps, are The Moneyed Man, Brambletj'e 
House, and Love and Magnetism — while James wrote Trips to Paris, Country Cousin, 
and other " good nonsense," for Charles Matthews the comedian. 

Sir John Bowring, LL. D., 1792 , lias been for half a century 

an active contributor to literature, as well as a busy negotiator in public 
affairs. 

His publications have been numerous, and embrace a wide circle of subjects, though 
his two leading lines of thought have been in Sclavonic literature and in political 
economy. He has written largely for the Westminster Review, of which, for many 
years, he was the editor, his articles being chiefly in advocacy of free trade and other 
kindred topics. He was the intimate friend and the literary executor of Jeremy 
Bentham, and edited the works of the latter in 22 vols., 8vo. He entered the House 
of Commons in 18.35, and continued in that office until 1849, when he was sent to 
Hong Kong to superintend the British trade in China. In 185-1: he was knighted, and 
made Governor of Hong Kong. 

His chief publications are the following: Specimens of the Russian Poets; Poetry 
of the Magyars ; Cheskian Anthology ; Servian Popular Poetry ; Specimens of the 
40 



470 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Polish Poets; Ancient Poetry and Romances of Spain ; Batavian Antholo.sry ; Matins 
andVesrjers; Minor Morals for Young People; First Lessons in Theology f.a- Yuinig 
Children; Decimal Coinage : Decimal System in Numbers, Coins, and Acconnts ; He- 
ports on the Conimeicial Relations between France and Great Britain; Reports on Ihe 
Statistics of Tuscany ; On the Oriental Plague and on Quarantines; The Kingdom 
and People of Siam, a narrative of the mission to that country. 

Henry Thomas, Lord Cockburn, 1779-1 854, a Scottish Judge and one of the early 
contributors to the Edinburgh Review, wrote Life and Correspondence of Lord Jeffrey ; 
Memorials of his Times; The Best Ways of Spoiling the Beauties of Edinburgh. 

Thomas Crofton Croker, 1798-1854, an Irishman, and a writer distinguished for 
wit and learning, has done much to throw light on the character and history of liis 
native country. Researches in the South of Ireland : Fairy Legends and Traditions 
in the South of Ireland; Legends of the Lakes; Memoirs of Joseph Holt, General of 
the Irish Rebels, in 1798; The Popular Songs of Ireland; Daniel O'Rourke; Barney 
Mahoney; My Village versus Our Village, etc. He was a frequent contributor to 
Frazer's Magazine. 

Kt. Hex. JoHX Wilson Croker, D. C. L., 1780-1857, held a prom- 
inent place in English letters for half a century. 

Croker was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and was a member of Parliament 
for about twenty-five years (1807-1S32). He was strongly opposed to the Reform 
Bill, and declared he would never sit in a Reformed House of Commons, a vow which 
he kept. He united with Scott and Canning in founding the London Quarterly as an 
antidote to the Edinburgh. His articles were noted for their ability and for their 
caustic wit. 

Croker's separate publications are Familiar Letters on the Irish Stage; An Inter- 
cepted Letter from Canton, being a satire on the city of Dublin ; Sketch of Ireland, 
Past and Present ; Songs of Trafalgar; The Battle of Talavera; The Naval War with 
America; The Suffolk Papers ; Reply to the Letters of Malachi Malagrowther; Stories 
from the History of England, written for juvenile readers, and verj' popular; An Edi- 
tion of Boswell's Life of Johnson. 

To this last work, Croker gave a large amount of labor, and held it as one of his 
capital achievements. Macaulay made it the butt of ridicule in one of his most fa- 
mous reviews in the Edinburgh, and Crolcer in due time returned the compliment by 
showing up, in the Quarterly, the shortcomings of Macaulay's History of England. 
Americans had no great love for Croker, as many of the insulting sneers in the Lon- 
don Quarterly came from his pen. 

Molr. 

David Macbeth Moie,, 1798-1870, a native of Scotland, studied at 
Edinburgh University, and afterwards led the life of a country physi- 
cian until his death. 

Moir was a man of great talents and strongly marlied character. He had no small share 
of poetic ability, and was endowed with an insight and asympathy that made liim a 
most genial and trustworthy critic. He was a permanent contributor to Blackwood's 
Magazine, commencing with the Ibuudation of the magazine, in 3817, and ceasing 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AND SCIEXCE. 471 

only with his death. His articles number almost four hundred. His poetical contri- 
butions to this magazine are those signed A. 

Besides these scattered testimonials to his ability, he published several stories and 
poems in book form, besides one or two medical treatises. Among his poems are The 
Legend of Genevieve and Domestic Verses. The best known of his stories is Mansie 
Wauch. Moir also delivered, in 1850-1, a course of lectures on the Poetical Literature 
of the Past Half-Centuiy, which was published in book form, and constitutes a most 
valuable contribution to English criticism. In the words of GilfiUau, "he criticizes 
in the spirit of a poet." 

James Cowles Prichaiid, 1785-1848, was a distinguished pliysi- 
cian and ethnologist. 

His principal works are: Researches into the Physical History of Mankind ; The 
Eastern Orig.n of the Celtic Nations ; and The Natural History of Man. lie also pub- 
lislied in lSi9 an Analysis of Egyptian Mythology, besides one or two medical works 
and numerous contributions to medical journals. 

Prichard's ethnological works are extremely valuable. He was the first to establish 
the fact that the Celtic races are a branch of the Indo-Germanic, and to place ethnol- 
ogy upon a purely inductive basis. Prichard is a strong champion of the unity of 
the human race. 

EoBERT Blakey, Ph. D., 1795 , born at Morpeth, Northum- 
berland, is a philosox^hical writer of high repute. 

His works are: History of Moral Science, 2 vols.; History of the Philosophy of the 
Mind, 4 vols. ; History of Political Literature, 2 vols. ; Essay on Logic ; Historical 
Sketch of Logic ; On Moral Good and Evil ; Lives of the Primitive Fathers of the 
Church; Temporal Benefits of Christianit3\ "We regard these volumes [Hist, of 
Philos. of Mind] as embodying little short of the substance of a library in them- 
selves." — Churcli of England Qiiarterhj. His work on The History of Moral Science 
secured him the approbation of Southey, Sir W. Hamilton, Chalmers, and others. 
That on The History of the Philosophy of Mind brought commendation from Cousin 
and numerous German savant, and a gold medal from the King of the Belgians. He 
was appointed in 1835 Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in Queen's College, Belfast, 
but declined on account of ill health. Dr. Blakey is the author of a large number 
of books on Angling and other sporting subjects. 

Hersehel. 

Sir John Frederick "William Herschel, D. C. L., 1792-1871, is 
chiefly known as an astronomer and mathematician. 

Herschel was educated at Cambridge, was Lord Rector of Marischal College, Aber- 
deen, and afterwards Director of the Royal Mint. 

Besides his numerous special contributions to astronomy and mathematics, Herschel 
h is written for the general public several works that stand deservedly high. These 
are : A Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy, Outlines of As- 
tronomy, Manual of Scientific Inquiry, and a number of essays in the Edinburgh 
aMd Quarterly Reviews. They present the leading truths of science in a style at once 
ch-ar and elegant. 

Sir John Herschel is but one member of an illustrious family. His father. SirWil- 



472 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

liam Herschel, 173S-1822, the son of a Hanoverian musician, migrated to England in 
1757, and there became the most eminent astronomer of his times. His untiring 
eflfoi'ts were successful in producing reflecting telescopes of a size never before 
dreamed of, and gave the science a fresh impulse. For many years he was assisted by 
his sister Caroline, who also published a number of independent observations. 

John Prixgle Nichol, 1804-1859, a native of Scotland, and Professor of Astronomy 
in Glasgow University, published a number of works on astronomj', intended to dis- 
seminate a knowledge of the general principles of the science. The chief of these 
are : Views of the Architecture of the Heavens ; Contemplations on the Solar Sys- 
tem ; A Critical Account of the Discovery of the Planet Neptune; and The Stellar 
Universe. Professor Nichol published also a Cyclopaedia of the Physical Sciences. 
His works are characterized throughout by clearness and elegance of style, being 
thereby admirably fitted for their special function. 

William Buckland, D. D., 1784-1856, Dean of Westminster, a learned theologian and 
a profound geologist, was for many years Professor of Minernlogy and Geology in Ox- 
ford. His principal work is Reliquiaj Diluvianas, or Observations on the Organic Re- 
mains in Caves, Fissures, and Diluvial Gravel. His other great work, and the one 
most suited for popular reading, was prepared as a Bridgewater Treatise, the subject 
being Geology and Mineralogy considered with reference to Natural Theology. Both 
works are of the highest order of merit. 

Hugh Miller. 

Hugh Miller, 1802-1856, a native of Scotland, was a man of the 
most marked character and talents. 

In early life he was employed as a day-laborer in a stone-quarry, where he not only 
worked out sandstone for his employers, but the geology of the old sandstone for him- 
self, and laid the deep and broad foundations for his subsequent fame. 

During the agitation attendant upon the celebrated Auchterarder case, in the 
Scotch ecclesiastical court. Miller published A Letter to Lord Brougham, attacking 
the latters decision. The ability of this letter attracted universal attention to the 
hitherto unknown writer, and Miller w-as made editor of The Witness, established as 
the organ of the free church party. This position he retained until his death, and 
published in the pages of this journal the fruits of the geological studies in which 
he was engaged. 

Miller's principal contributions, in book -form, to science are : The Old Red Sandstone ; 
Footprints of the Creator; Testimony of the Rocks. The work last named has an interest 
apart from its scientific -^alue, for it was the cause of the author's death. The unre- 
mitting exertion and anxiety attendant upon its preparation threw him into a highly 
morbid state of mind, in which he committed suicide. Miller is the author also of a 
volume of Poems little known, and a volume of Scenes and Legends from the North 
of Scotland. A large portion, also, of his First Impressions of England is devoted to 
the English poets. 

Miller's stj'le is a model of clearness and vigor and adaptation to the mind of the 
non-professional reader. No one has done more to render the science of geology 
popular in a legitimate way. The Testimony of the Rocks is a masterly attempt to 
reconcile Geolog.y with Genes's, or rather to show that the science of the earth's 
formation is no more antagonistic to revelation than is astronomy, that the two are 
co-ordinate and uot antagonistic. 



LITERATURE, POLITICS, AXD SCIEXCE. 473 

GiBEON Algernon- Mvxtell, 17P0-1S52, was a distinguished English geologist and 
writer on geology. Mantell is noted for his discoveries in the Wealden formation in 
England. He also publislied a number of w-rks popularizing the science. The most 
important of thesi- are : On tbo Iguano Jon ; The Geology of the South-East of England ; 
The Wonders of Geology, and The Medals of Creation. 

DiONTSius Lardxer, LL. D., 179-3-18.59, a native of Dublin and a graduate of Trinity 
College, was the author of a large number of scientific works. He is chiefly known to 
the public by his Popular Lectures on the Steam Engine, and in the United States by 
his course of Scientific Lectures, which were afterwards collected and published. Dr. 
Lardner was also the projector and editor of Tlie Cabinet Cyclopsedia in 134 vols., and 
contributed several of the treatises contained in it. 

Thomas Thomson, 1773-1852, was in his dav one of the leading 
chemists of the world. 

Thomson was a native of Scotland and a graduate of the University of St. Andrew's. 
He was appointed, in 1818, Professor of Chemistry in the University of Glasgow^ which 
position he retained until his resignation in 1846. Thomson's name is associated in- 
dissolu:/ly with the annals of chemistry. His labors in this department of science 
were unremitting and highly productive of practical results. His article on Mineral- 
ogy, published in 1798, in the supplement to the Encycloptedia Britannica, was the 
first attempt to introduce the use of chemical symbols. Similarly, in his third edi- 
tion of the Outlines of Chemistry, 1807, he introduced Dalton's atomic theory. Thom- 
son was the discoverer of many new minerals, and the author of numerous treatises 
on chemistry, besides editing, after the death of his brother, James Thomson, the third 
edition of the Encyclopadia Britannica, aud founding the Annals of Philosophy. 

James F. W. Johxstox, 179&-1So.5, a native of Paisley, Scotland, was a Reader in 
Chemistry and Mineralogy in the Univei'sity of Durham. He published Elements of 
Agricultural Chemistry and Geology; Suggestions for Experiments in Agriculture; 
Catecliism of Agricultural Chemistry and Geology, translated into many languages; 
Lecturers on Agriculture, Chemistry, and Geology; Contributions to Scientific Agri- 
culture, and numerous other works of the same character; Notes on North America, 
agricultural, economical, and social ; The Chemistry of Common Life. 

Xeil Arxott, M. D., F. K. S., 1789 , though intensely occu- 
pied in his professional pursuits, found leisure for some works of a 
popular character. 

Among his works are A Surrey of Human Progress, an Essay on "Warming andTen- 
tilating. Smokeless Fireplace, and Elements of Physics. Tlie work last named was 
first publislied in 1827. It is natural philosophy, general and medical, explained in 
plain or non-technical language. Of this work, five editions, amounting to 10,000 
copies, were called for within six years, and it was translated into all European lan- 
gUHges except the Italian. Arnott's Physics was reproduced in the United States, and 
is a familiar text-book in our schools and colleges. 

Dr. Arnott is of a Scottish family, resident near Montrose. He was educated at the 
Gramniar-Scbool and the University of Aberdeen. lie is a practising physician in 
London, and Physician Extraordinary to the Queen. 
40* 



474 WOEDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Sm Charles Bell, 1778-1842, was a native of Edinburgh, and a Professor of Surgery 
in that city, though his chief celebrity was gained lu London. As a scientific surgeon, 
he stood at the hoad of his inofession, and his contributions to surgical science are 
many and of tlie liighest order. He jjublished also several works of a popular cast, 
connected with his professional pursuits. Two of these are worthy of particular 
note: The Hand, its Mechanism and Vital Endowments as evincing Design, being 
one of the Bridgewater Treatises ; and An Essay on the Anatomy of Expression in 
Painting. Both these works have received unqualified commendation, and have 
become classical on the subjects of which they treat. 

William Benjamin Carpenter, M. p., F. R. S., 1813 , a son of Lant Carpenter, 

is one of the most eminent physiologists of the century, lie graduated at the 
University of Edinburgh, and is Professor in University College, London. His pub- 
lications on Physiology have been numerous, and are regarded as of the highest 
authority: General and Comparative Physiology; Human Physiology; Vegetable 
Physiology; Popular Cyclopasdia of Natural Science; Zoology and Instinct in Ani- 
mals; The Microscope, its Revelations and Uses; The Use of Alcoholic Liquors, in 
Health and Disease, a prize essay. 

George Combe, 1788-1858, was a native of Edinburgh, and a lawyer by profession. 
Becoming interested in phrenology, he devoted himself almost exclusively to the ad- 
vocacy of its doctrines, both by lecturing and by books. In connection with others, 
he established the Phrenological Journal, and he was, in his day, the leading repre- 
sentative of the doctrines of Gall and Spurzheim. His works are A System of Plire- 
nology; The Constitution of Man in Relation to External Objects; Lectures o'n Moral 
Philosophy; On Phrenology; On Popular Education; The Pi-inciples cf Criminal 
Legislation; Phrenology applied to Painting and Sculpture; Science and Religion; 
Notes on the United States, etc. His Constitution of Man has had a very large sale 
both in England and America, and has been translated into German, French, and 
Swedish, etc. 

Andrew Combe, M.D., 1797-1847, was a native of Edinburgh, where also he studied 
medicine, and practised, lie wrote much on the popular aspects of medical science: 
Observations on Mental Derangements ; The Principles of Physiology applied to the 
Preservation of Health ; The Physiology of Digestion ; Physiological and Moral Alan- 
agement of Infancy, etc. Dr. Combe, like his brother George Combe, was a convert 
to phrenology. His writings have circulated extensively in the United States. 

William Youatt, 1777-1847, was Professor in the Royal Veterinary College, London. 
He has written a large number of books, which aj-e not only valuable as authorities 
in his special line of knowledge, but have a general interest for their humane tenden- 
cies : Canine Madness; The Horse; Sheep, Their Breeds, Management, and Diseases; 
Cattle; The Dog, its History and Diseases; The Pig; The Complete Grazier; The 
Stock-Raiser's Manual, etc. 



IV. WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 

Chalmers. 

Thomas Chalmers, D. D., LL. D., 1780-1847, was the 
most eminent Scotch divine of his day, and one of the great 
men of all time. 



WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 475 

Chalmers first became celebrated as a preacher in the Tron Church, 
Glasgow, where his pulpit discourses attracted great attention. His 
abilities as a writer of the first order became conspicuous by the essay 
on Christianity, which he prepared for the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia. 
He next appeared as a great and original thinker on the difficult ques- 
tions of political economy, particularly those connected with pauper- 
ism, and his writings on this subject are alone a noble monument of 
his genius. He was appointed to the chair of Moral Philosophy in the 
University of St. Andrew's, and afterwards to that of Theology in the 
University of Edinburgh. He became the active and acknowledged 
leader of the Free Church party in the disruption movement, and 
when the crisis came, he resigned his professorship. He was made 
Professor of Theology in the Theological School founded by the Free 
Church, and he continued to the end of his days to devote his great 
talents to the work of organizing and consolidating its affairs. His 
pre-eminent abilities obtained recognition in his receiving the degree 
of LL. D. from the University of Oxford, and in being elected a cor- 
responding member of the Royal Institute of France, " honors never 
before accorded to a Presbyterian divine, and seldom to a Scotchman." 

Chalmers's works, including those published posthumouslj^ and the four volumes 
of Memoirs by his son-in-law, Dr. Hanna, which consist in some measure of extracts 
from his Diary and Letters, amount to 38 volumes. The subjects are as follows : Nat- 
ural Theology, 2 vols.; Christian Evidences, 2 vols. ; Moral Philosophy, 1 vol.; Com- 
mercial Discourses, 1 vol.; Astronomical Discourses, 1 vol.; Congregational Sermons, 
3 vols.; Sermons on Public Occasions, 1 vol.; Tracts and Essays, 1 vol.; Introductory 
Essays to Select Authors, 1 vol.; Polity of Nations, 3 vols.; Church Establishments, 
1 vol. ; Church Extension, 1 vol. ; Political Economy, 2 vols. ; Parochial System. 1 vol. ; 
Lectures on the Romans. 4 vols. ; Daily Scripture Readings, 3 vols. ; Sabbath Scrip- 
ture Readings, 2 vols.; Sermons Illustrative of Different Stages of his Ministry, 1 
vol.; Institutes of Theology, 2 vols.; Prelections on Butler's Analogy, 1 vol.; Me- 
moirs, 4 vols. 

"We meet Dr. Chalmers, as we should the war-horse in Job, with feelings which 
almost unfit us for marking his port or measuring his paces: 'his neck is clothed 
with thunder, the glory of his nostrils is terrible, he paweth in the vallej^, and rejoic- 
eth in his strength.' "—Congrpgational Magazine. "To activity and enterprise he has 
read a new lesson, to disinterested but far-seeing goodness he has supplied a new mo- 
tive, to philanthropy he has given a new impulse, and to the pulpit anew inspiration ; 
and wliilst he has added another to the short catalogue of this world's great men, he 
has gone up, another and a majestic on-looker. to the cloud of witnesses." — North 
British Review. 

Chalmers was great in whatever he undertook. As a man of affairs, his greatest 
work was what he did in leading the Free Church. As a man of letters, his greatest 
work was probably his Astronomical Discourses. None of his writings certainly have 
thus far had such enduring popularity. 



476 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

The Bridgewater Treatises. 

The Kev. Francis Henry Egerton, Earl of Bridgewater, at his death, 
1829, left eight thousand pounds sterling, to be paid to the person or 
persons who should prepare a suitable work on the power, wisdom, and 
goodness of God, as shown in the creation. The sum was divided be- 
tween eight persons, each of whom prepared a " Bridgewater " Trea- 
tise. They are the foli owing: 

1. Dr. Chalmeus : The Adaptation of External Nature to the Moral and Intellectual 
Constitution of Man. 

2. Dr. John Kidd : The Adaptation of External Nature to the Physical Condition 
of Man. 

3. Dr. Whewell : Astronomy and General Physics, with reference to Natural 
Theology. 

4. Sir Charles Bell: The Hand, its Mechanism and Tital Endowments as evincing 
Design. 

5. Dr. Roget : Animal and Tegetable Physiology, with reference to Natural The- 
ology. 

6. Prof. Bdckland : Geology and Mineralogy, with refei-cnce to Natural Tlieology. 

7. Dr. Kirbt: The History, Habits, and Instincts of Animals. 

8. Dr. Prout : Chemistry, Meteorology, and Digestion. 

The whole have been printed in 12 vols., and are considered an extremely valuable 
contribution to the literature of the subject. 

Tracts for the Times. 

Among the noticeable features, in the theological literature of this 
period, is a remarkable series of Essays, under the title of Tracts for 
the Times. 

These Tracts were of various sizes, from small pamphlets, such as usually pass under 
the name of tracts, up to good-sized volumes. 

The Tractarian movement began in 1833. The originators of it were Pusey, Keble, 
J. H. Newman, R. H. Froude, Rose, Isaac Williams, Ward, and Oakely. The move- 
ment began with a private meeting of a few clergymen at the house of Rev. Hugh 
James Rose, at Hadleigh, in Suffolk. These gentlemen thought that the Church of 
England was in danger from certain political tendencies in the Government, and they 
resolved to undertake to counteract these tendencies by writing a series of thoughtful 
and scholarly tracts, setting forth, in a calm and sober way, the views which they held 
in regai-d to the character and functions of the church. The main points on which 
they insisted wei-e the doctrines of Apostolical Succession, Baptismal Regeneratio!', 
andTlie Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. The writers called themselves 
Anglo-Catholics. 

Tlie Tracts for the first two or three years attracted little attention. After a time, 
howeA-^er, as one tract followed another, and as the doctrines set forth became more 
and more sharply defined, the jiublic mind became excited, and a general agitation 
ensued, which shook to the foundations not only the Church of England, but the 
Episcopal Church in the United States. A more remarkable instance of great prac- 
tical results from a quiet but persistent written discussion is hardly to be found. 



WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 477 

Several of the leaders, Newman. Ward, Oakely, Archdeacon TTilborforce, and about 
two hundred other clergymen, with an equal number of prominent laymen, went over 
to the Church of Koine. 

In Tract No. 87, Williams advocated the doctrine of Reserve in Religious Truths ; 
and the Tract No. 90, the most famous and the last of all, by Dr. Newman, brought on 
the crisis. In this Tract Dr. Newman undertook to show that men might hold che 
Tridentine views and yet remain in the Church of England. 

Essays and Reviews. 

In 1860 a volume appeared called Essays and Reviews. It was a 
sort of rebound from the extreme high church doctrines of the Tracts 
for the Times, and contained doctrines which it seemed difficult for 
ordinary Christians to reconcile with any fixed belief in Christianity 
and the Bible. 

Being written by men who were members and dignitaries of the Church of Eng- 
land, the Essays and Reviews produced a prodigious agitation, and an attempt was 
made to silence and punish the writers, by ecclesiastical and legal proceedings, accord- 
ing to the forms peculiar to the English national church. A decision adverse to the 
writers was obtained in the Court of Arches, the highest eccle>iastical court, in 
1862 ; but the decision was reversed on a final appeal to the Privy Council, in 1864. 

The articles which composed this memorable volume were the following: 1. The 
Education of the World, by Frederick Temple, D.D., Head Master of Rugby School ; 
2. Bunsen's Biblical Researches, by Rowland Williams, D. D., Hebrew Professor of 
St. David's College, Lampeter ; 3. On the Study of the Evidences of Christianity, by 
Baden Powell, F. R. S., Savilian Professor at Oxford; 4. The National Church, by 
Henry Bristow Wilson, B. D., Professor of Anglo-Saxon at 0.xford ; 5. On the Mosaic 
Cosmogony, by C. W. Goodwin, M.A.; 6. Tendencies of Religious Thought in Eng- 
land, 1688-1775, by Mark Pattison, B.D., Rector of Lincoln College, Oxford; 7. On 
the Interpretation of Scripture, by Benjamin Jowett, Regius Professor of Greek at 
Oxford. 

The excitement produced by the publication of Essays and Reviews was greater 
even than that produced by Tracts for the Times. Besides the agitation of this sub- 
ject in Convocation and in the Courts, more than fifty controversial volumes and 
pamphlets about it have been published. As under the influence of the Tracts for 
the Times many members of the Church of England went over to the Chxirch of 
Rome, so under the influence of the Essays and Reviews many have become thor- 
oughly and openly infidel. 

Wilberforee. 

William Wilberforce, 1759-1833, is known all over the world 
by his labors for the abolition of the slave-trade. He is almost equally 
well known in Christian circles by his work, A Practical View of 
Christianity. 

Wilberforee was born at Hull, and graduated at Cambridge. At the University he 
formed an intimacy with William Pitt and Isaac Milner. Milncr's influence, joined 
to that of Doddridge's Rise and Progress, awakened in Wilberforee that earnest reli- 
gious spirit which marked his life ever afterwards. He was also influenced in the 



478 WORDSWORTH — HIS COis^TE MPOR ARIES. 

same direction by a pious aunt, who had been one of Whitefield's converts and ad- 
mirers. He entered Parlinment in 17fcO. and remained- in it for forty-five years, or 
until 1825. He began the agitation for the abolition of the slave-trade in 1787, and 
followed it up, in Parliament and out of Parliament, for twenty years, until finally, 
in 1807, the bill abolishing the trade was i)assed. He lived mIso to see slavery itself 
abolished in the British West Indies, the bill to that effect having passed iu l.i>'63, 
only a few days before his death. 

Besides his numerous Speeches, Addresses, and public Letters on the Slave-Trade, 
and on Slavery, Wilberforce wrote a work already referred to, commonly called Wil- 
berforce's Practical View, which had a wonderful influence on the religious character 
of the higher classes in Great Britain. What Wesley and Whitefield did for the lower 
and middle classes, Wilberforce, both by his book and by his personal character, did 
to a great extent for the nobility and gentry. He awakened them from that state of 
indifference and practical infidelity into which they had fallen, and recalled them to 
more serious views of life. The moderate tone of his book, together with his own 
genial and persuasive manners, joined to his high position as a statesman and a publi- 
cist, gave added force to his religious arguments, as the same qualities did to his politi- 
cal and philanthropic appeals. 

The full title of his book is " A Practical Tiew of the Prevailing Religious System 
of Professed Christians in the Higher and Middle Classes in this Country, Contrasted 
with Real Christianity." Wilberforce s Life, consisting in large measure of his letters 
and other writings, was published by his sons Robert and Samuel, in 5 vols., Svo. 

As au orator, Wilberforce "distinguished himself in Parliament by an engaging 
natural eloquence, set off by the sweetest and most exquisitely modulated of human 
voices, whilst his affectionate heart, caressing manners, and brilliant wit made him 
the most delightful of companions." — Macaulay. 

Samuel Wilberforce, D. D., 1805 , a son of William Wil- 
berforce, was born at Broomfield, Clapham Common, and educated at 
Oxford, where he was greatly distinguished for scholarship. 

Dr. Wilberforce has risen through a series of honorable appointments to his present 
eminent position of Bishop of Winchester, having previously been chaplain to Prince 
Albert, Lord High Almoner to the Queen, Select Preacher before the University of 
Cxford, and Bishop of Oxford. He has published the following works : Note-Book of 
a Country Clergyman, intended to illustrate the practical working of the parochial 
system of the Church of England ; Sermons preached before the University of Oxford ; 
Agathos and other Sunday Stories ; The Rocky Island and Other Parables ; Four Ser- 
mons Preached before the Queen ; History of the Protestant Episcopal Church in 
America; Heroes of Hebrew History ; Addresses to Candidates for Ordination ; several 
volumes of Sermons, and numerous separate sermons and addresses. 

Robert Isaac Wilberforce, 1800-1857, another son of William 
Wilberforce, was educated at Oxford, and became successively arch- 
deacon of the East Eiding of Yorkshire, and Prebendary of York. 

In 1854, lie became a Catholic, and set out for Rome, by invitation of the Pope, for 
the purpose of entering the priesthood of the Roman Church, but died on his way. at 
Albano. He published The Five Empires, an outline of ancient history ; Rutilius and 
Lucius, or Stories of the Third Age; Church Courts and Church Discipline, showing 
the necessity and duty of the State's abandoning all legislation on church matters ; 



WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 479 

Tlie Christian Kingdom the Witness of Christ ; Sermons on the New Birth of Man's 
Nature; Tlie Doctrine of the Incarnation ; The Doctrine of Holy Baptism ; History of 
Erastianism ; Doctrine of the Holy Eucharist. 

Edward Wiluerforce, son of Archdeacon R. I. Wilberforce, and grandson of "Wil- 
liam Wilberforce, served some years in the navy. He was married in ISbO to an 
American lady. He has published Brazil Viewed through a Naval Glass ; Social Life 
in Munich ; One with Another, a Novel ; The Duke's Honor, a Novel ; Franz Schubert, 
a musical biography, translated from the German; Poems. 

John Pye Smith, D. D., LL. D., 1774-1851, was an accomplished 
and able theologian, belonging to the English Independents. 

Dr. Smith was born in Sheffield, where his father was a bookseller. He was for 
fifty years, lSOO-1850, Tutor or Professor, part of the time of Classics and part of the 
time of Divinity, in the Independent Theological Academy at Homerton. When 
Homerton, Highbury, and Coward Colleges were united in 1850 in the formation of 
New College, St. John's Wood, a Testimonial Fund of £3000 was raised for Dr. Smith, 
and he was permitted to retire from active duty. His chief work, The Scripture Tes- 
timony to the Messiah, 3 vols., Svo, has been regarded with great faA-or, and has been 
frequently reprinted. His other works are for the most part subsidiary to this. They 
are Four Discussions on the Sacrifice and Priesthood of Christ; Principles of Inter- 
pi-etation as applied to the Prophecies ; Personality and Divinity of the Holy Spirit ; 
The Mosaic Account of the Deluge; Scripture and Geology, etc. 

Charles Simeon, 1759-1836, a distinguished clergyman of the 
Church of England, was rector of Trinity Church, Cambridge, for fifty- 
three years, from 1783 to 1836. 

Mr. Simeon was celebrated as a preacher. He published a work on the composi- 
tion of sermons, which in successive editions grew until, in its final form, it appeared 
in 17 vols., Svo, under the title of Horaj Homileticas. It consists mainly of Skele- 
tons of Sermons on passages of Scripture, so arranged as to make a sort of running 
commentary on the whole Bible. There are over twenty-five hundred of these Skele- 
tons. Simeon's Complete Works fill 21 volumes. 

Blanco White. 

Eev. Joseph Blanco White, 1775-1841, attracted great attention 
by his writings on points in controversy between Catholics and Protes- 
tants. 

Mr. White was born at Seville, in Spain, a descendant of an Irish Catholic family 
who had settled in that country. He was educated for the priesthood, and was or- 
dained a priest in 1799. Becoming unsettled in his religious opinions, he went inlMO 
to England, where he spent the remainder of his life. He purposed at one time con- 
necting himself with the Church of England, but afterwards declared himself a Uni- 
tarian. From the autobiography which he left behind, he seems to have wavered to 
the last, without linving ever attained any fixed belief. He was a man of vigorous 
intellect, and lie wrote many works. These, being mostly either upon Spanish affairs, 



480 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. , 

or upon the pending controversies between Catholics and Protestants, and mixed up 
a good deal with his own personal history, attracted great attention. 

The most important of his works was that published posthumously. Life of Rev. 
Joseph Blanco White, written by Himself, with Portions of his Correspondence, 3 
vols., 8vo. The titles of some of his other works are Letters from Spain ; Practical 
and Internal Evidence against Catholicism ; Dialogues Concerning the Chnrch of 
Kome; Observations on Heresy and Orthodoxy, etc. 

EiCHAKD Watson, 1781-1833, was a leading theologian among the 
Methodists. 

Watson was born in Lincolnshire. He became a preacher at fifteen, and published 
his first work, An Apology for the People called Methodists, at nineteen. His works 
are numerous, and are in excellent repute. The chief is his Theological Institutes. 3 
vols , 8vo, a standard work on theology. Some of his other works are A Defence of 
Wesleyan Missions; The Eternal Sonship of Christ; Life of Mesley; Biblical and 
Theological Dictionary ; Universal Redemption, etc. His Works complete have been 
published in 13 vols., 8vo. 

Kalph Wardlaw, D. D., 1779-1853, was in his day the most cele- 
brated i^reacher and divine of the Scotch Independents. 

Wardluw was a Seceder by birth, being a descendant of the celebrated Ebenezer 
Erskine. He studied first at the University of Glasgow, and then at the Divinity Hall 
of the Secession Church at Selkirk ; but before completing his studies, he adopted 
the views of the Independents and entered the ministry of that chnrch. He was 
pastor of the Congregational Church in Glasgow fifty years, from 1803 to 1853, and 
was also Professor of Theology in the Independent Theological Academy of that city 
from 1811 to tbe time of his death. Besides discharging the duties of his pastorate 
and of his professor's chair. Dr. Wardlaw was active with his pen, and wrote a large 
number of works. 

The most important of his works are Christian Ethics; The Nature and Extent of 
the Atonement; Discourses on the Socinian Controversy; Essays on Assurance of 
Faith, etc.; Discourses on the Sabbath; On Miracles; Congregational Independency ; 
On Infant Baptism : National Church Establishments Examined ; Systematic Theol- 
ogy; Lectures on Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, Zechariah, Romans, and James. Allibone 
enumerates twenty-five different publications, several of them in 2 or 3 volumes. 

Thomas McCrie, D. D., 1772-1835, was a very eminent Scotch 
theologian of this period. 

Dr. MtCrie was a native of Dunse, Scotland, and a graduate of Edinburgh. He was 
for ten years minister of a congregation in Edinburgh, but afterwards became Pro- 
fessor of Divinity to the Constitutional Associate Presbytery. 

Dr. McCrie applied himself particularly to the studj' of the history of the Reforma- 
tion, and his learned works on this subject are received with great favor by all Pres- 
byterians. Two of his works, Tlie Life of John Knox, and The Life of Andrew Mel- 
ville, are in f;ict a history of the Reformation in Scotland. Besides these, he wrote A 
History of the Progress and Suppression of the Reformation in Italy, and A History 
of the Progress and Suppression of the Reformation in Spain. 



WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 481 

McCrie published also several other works, but these four, the Lives of Knox and 
5Ielville, and the histor}' of the Reformation in Italy and in Spain, are the chief. Among 
Lis minor works was an extended critique upon Old Mortality, vindicating the Cove- 
nanters, and undertaking to show that Scott's picture of them was a caricature. He 
pressed the argument so seriously that Scott was forced to reply. 

Kitto. 

John Kitto, D. D., 1804-1854, is a signal instance of what may be 
accomplished by courage and perseverance, in the face of difficulties. 

Kitto was a native of Plymouth, the son of a mason. In his twelfth year, while 
assisting his father, Kitto fell from the roof of a building, and was so injured that he 
lost his hearing, and remained totally deaf the rest of his life. Notwithstanding his 
deafness and his poverty, he struggled manfully with the difBculties of his lot, and 
beciime famous for his learning and his works. 

Kitto published a great many works upon sacred subjects and upon travels in the 
East. His principal work, however, is his Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature, first 
published in 1843, and since then in many succeeding editions. Dr. Kitto was also 
editor of Kitto's Sunday Readings and Kitto's Journal of Sacred Literature. 

" The name of Dr. Kitto is now immortally associated with biblical study and litera- 
ture. The measure of his success is not more amazing in its amount than the means 
by which he reached it. His life is as instructive as are his labors, and both combined 
present an unequalled picture of triumph over obstacles which have been so rarely 
surmounted, and which fewer still have mastered to such advantage. . . . "What a con- 
trast between the deaf and dumb pauper boy of 1819, wheedled into a workhouse to 
keep him ' from hunger and fasting, cold and nakedness,' and the John Kitto of 1854, — 
Doctor of theology, though a layman, Member of the Society of Antiquaries, Editor of 
the Pictorial Bible and of the Biblical Encyclopaedia, and author of the Daily Bible Il- 
lustrations! The interval between the two extremes was long, and sometimes gloomy; 
yet he bore bravely up, with earnest resolution and strong faith in God." — Dr. Eadie. 

Herbert Marsh, D.D., 1757-1839. a learned Bishop of the English Church, studied 
first at Cambridge, and afterwards for several years at Gottingen. Ilis principal works 
are A History of the Translations of the Holy Scriptures ; Lectures on the Authen- 
ticity and Credibility of the Mew Testament; Lectures on a Systematic Arrangement 
of the Several Branches of Divjnity; A Translation of J. D. Michaelis's Introduction 
to the New Testament, etc. 

Richard M^nt, D. D., 1776-1848, a learned Bishop of the English Church, did an 
eminent service in conjunction with Dr D'Oyley, in the preparation of a popular Com- 
mentarj' on the Scriptures, which has had an immense circulation. In addition to 
this he published The British Months, a Poem in 12 parts ; Miscellaneous Poems ; 
History of the Church of Ireland; and numerous other works of a religious character. 
Some of Bishop Manfs Hymns are higldy esteemed. 

George D'Oylet, D. D., 1778-1846, was a learned divine of the English Church. In 
conjunction with Bishop M;int he prepared The Annotated Bible, for the Society for 
Promoting Christian Knowledge. It was in o vols., 4to, and was a most elaborate work. 
The sale of it in England has been very large, and it was reprinted in the United 
States with additions by Bishop Uobart. Dr. D'Oyley was a contributor to the London 
41 2 F " 



482 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Quarterlj^ Review, and published several otiier works. But his labors on the Anno- 
tated Bible were his best and most iniportant work. 

Christopher Andersox, 1782-1852, an eminent Baptist preacher of Edinbnrgh, is 
chiefly known in this country by his Annals of the English Bible, in 2 vols., 8vo. 
Though defective in some respects, it is by far the best work extant on this subject. 
From its diligent and comprehensive citation of authorities, it is indispensable to 
any one who wishes to study the history of the English version of the Scriptures. 
His other works are : Services and Design of the Domestic Institution ; Historical 
Sketches of the Ancient Native Irish ; Singular Introduction of the English Bible. 

Eev. Henhy Blunt, 1794-1843, was a clergyman of the English 
Church, and a very popular writer on religious subjects, some of whose 
works have gone through forty editions in England, besides being fre- 
quently reprinted in the United States. 

Blunfs works are mostly in tlie shape of continued sermons or lectures on certain 
portions of the Sacred Volume, or on certain topics connected with religious truth 
and duty ; eight Lectures on the History of Jacob ; twelve on Abraham ; on Elisha ; 
twelve on St. Paul; nine on St. Peter; On the History of Christ; Sermons, On the 
Sacrament ; On the Lord's Day ; Discourses, On the Doctrinal Articles of the Church 
of England; On the Trials of the Spirit; A Practical Exposition of the Epistles to 
the Seven Churches ; A Family Exposition of the Pentateuch, etc. 

Rev. Edward Bickersteth, 1786-1850, was a laborious minister of the English 
Church, and a prolific writer on subjects connected with practical religion. His works 
have been published in 17 vols , 8vo. The Scripture Help, designed to assist in read- 
ing the Bible profitably, has had a prodigious sale. Other popular works are : The 
Christian Student, Justification by Faith, A Treatise on the Lord's Supper, A Practical 
Guide to the Prophecies, Christian Truth, etc. 

Rev. James Bennett, 1774-1862, an English Dissenting clergyman, wrote, jointly 
with David Bogue, a History of the Dissenters, 4 vols., intended as a continuation of 
Neal's History of the Puritans; also, Lectures on the History of Jesus Christ, 2 vols., 
Svo ; Theology of the Early Christian Church ; Lectures on the Acts ; Justification 
by Faith ; and other works. 

William Archer Botler, 1814-1818, a native of Ireland, and a Catholic by educa- 
tion, but a convert to the Protestant faith, was Professor of Moral Philosophy in 
Trinity College, Dublin. Besides a volume of Sermons, he published Letters on the 
Development of Christian Doctrine ; Letters on Protestantism ; Lectures on the His- 
tory of Ancient Philosophy. 

Lant Carpenter, LL. D., 1780-1840, an English Unitarian, was a voluminous writer 
on religious and educational subjects. Works : Unitarianism the Doctrine of the 
Gospel; Examination of the Charges against Unitarianism by Dr. Magee in his Work 
on the Atonement ; Principles of Education, Intellectual, Moral, and Physical: Har- 
mony, or Synoptical Arrangement of the Gospels, etc. 

Josiah Conder, 1789-1855, was born in London, the son of a bookseller, and was 
himself booksellel-, publisher, and author. He pui'chased the Eclectic Review in 1814, 



WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 483 

and continued to be its editor until 1S37. He had the co-operation of many eminent 
\vriters among tlie Kon-contormists, such as Robert Hall, John Foster, Dr. Vaughan, 
etc. His own works are numerous: Protestant Non-conformity; A New Translation 
of the Epistle to the Hebrews; The Law of the Sabbath; The Choir and the Oratory; 
The Poet of the Sanctuary ; History of Italy ; The Star in the East ; Dictionary of 
Ancient and Modern Geography ; View of All Religions ; Modern Traveller ; Literary 
History' of the New Testament. 

Eey. Thomas Dick, LL. D., 1774-1857, was a learned theologian 
and philosopher of the Secession Church of Scotland. 

Dick's works are numerous and extremely valuable. The Christian Philosopher, or 
the Connection of Science with Religion ; The Philosophy of Religion ; The Philoso- 
jihy of a Future State; The Improvement of Society by the Diffusion of Knowl- 
edge; The Mental Illumination and Moral Improvement of Mankind; Christian 
Beneficence contrasted with Courteousness; Celestial Scenery; The Sidereal Heavens ; 
The Practical Astronomer ; The Solar System ; The Telescope and Microscope, etc. 
Dr. Dick's works have been reprinted in the United States, in 10 vols., 12mo. 

Key. William Goode, D.D., 1801 , Dean of Eipon, has written 

numerous works, chiefly against the doctiines ])\it forth in the Oxford 
Tracts. 

Works: The Extraordinary Gifts of the Spirit; The Established Church ; The Di- 
vine Rule of Faith and Practice; Tract "90" Historicall}' Refuted; Doctrine of the 
Church of England as to the Effects of Baptism in the Case of Infants ; Disputed 
Points in the Ceremonial of the Church of England, etc. 

Dean Goode was educated at St Paul's School, and at Cambridge, where he took 
high honors. He was for several years editor of The Christian Observer. 

Rev. FR.A.NCIS Goode, 1797-1842, a divine of the Church of England, has written 
several works that are in excellent repute : The Better Covenant, which has passed 
throuj^h many editions ; Watchwords of Gospel Truth ; Sermons, -etc. 

Alexander Duff. 

Alexander Dltf, D. D., LL. D., 1806 , is a native of Perth- 
shire, Scotland, and a prominent minister of the Free Church. 

Dr. Duff is well known in the United States, which he visited in 1854. He has great 
power and fervor iis a preacher, and draws large audiences wherever he goes. He has 
distinguished himself by his zeal for foreign missions, and has himself planted a most 
successful mission at Calcutta. He has published : Missions the Chief End of the 
Christian Church; India and Indian Missions; Missionary Addresses; The Indian Re- 
bellion, its Causes and Results : The Jesuits, their Origin, etc. ; Addresses at the Assem- 
bly of the Free Church ; New Era of the English Language and Literature in India. 

Ebenezee. Henderson, D. D., 1784-1858, was an eminent biblical 
scholar and critic, and Professor of Theology among the Lidepen- 
dents. 



484 WORDSWORTH HIS COXTE M POR A RIES . 

Henderson was born at Dtinfermline, Scotland. He was emploj-edat one time by the 
Bible Society in supplying the people of Scotland with the Scriptures. Ilis principal 
works are the following: Journal of a Residence in Ireland; Biblical Researches and 
Travels in Russia; The Great Mystery of Godliness Incontrovertible; Commentary 
on Isaiah, with a New Translation; Commentary on the Twelve Minor Prophets, etc. 

J0LIUS Charles Hare, 1796-1855, Archdeacon in the Church of England,-educated 
at Cambridge, author of a number of sermons and theological works, is best known as 
one of the authors — in conjunction with Augustus William Hare, his brother, and 
others — of Guesses at Truth. He was also associated with Bishop Thirlwall in tran?.- 
lating vols. 1 and 2 of Niebuhr's History of Rome. lu 1848 he edited the tales and 
essays of John Sterling, with a Memoir. 

John J. Contbeaee, 1779-1824, was Professor of Poetry in Oxford. Publications: 
The Bampton Lectures for 1824, on the Interpretation of Scripture ; Illustrations of 
Anglo-Saxon Poetry. — "William D. Conyleare, 1787-1857, was eminent both as a 
theologian and as a ciiltivator of natural sciences. Publications : Bampton Lectures 
for 1849, on the Fathers during the Ante-Nicene Period; Theological Lectures; Out- 
lines of the Geology of England and Wales. — William J. Coxtbeare, d. 1857, son of 
"William D. Conybeare, was Principal of the Collegiate Institution, Liverpool. In 
connection with Rev. John S. Ilowson, he wrote the Life and Epistles of Paul, 2 
vols., 4to, a work of extraordinary merit, and one of the best extant for enabling a 
person to understand the full force and meaning of Paul's life and labors. 

John S. Howson, 1815 , Dean of Chester, is chiefly known in the United States 

by the publication of the Life and Epistles of Paul, 2 A'ols., 4to, made jointly by Cony- 
beare and Howson. In addition to his share in this work. Dean Howson has written 
Eternal Life through Christ Only, a prize essay ; Sennons on Good and Bad Habits ; 
Sermons for Family Reading, etc. 

John Harris, D. D,, 1804-1856, a Dissenting divine, obtained great 
celebrity by his writings on practical religion. 

He was born at Ugborough, and became Principal of New College. His chief works 
are the following : The Great Teacher ; Mammon, or Covetousness the Sin of the Chris- 
tian Church, a prize essay, of which more than 100,000 copies were sold; The Great 
Commission, also a prize essay ; The Pre-Adamite Earth ; Man Primeval ; Patriarchy, 
or the Family, its Constitution, etc.; The Christian Citizen; The Witnessing Church; 
The Condition and Claims of France. 



The Haldanes. 

Egbert Haldane, 1764-1842, was originally an officer in the 
Eoyal Navy, but left the service for the purpose of preaching and 
spreading the gospel. 

He became an Independent itinerating minister, and spent a large fortune in erect- 
ing houses of worship and educating ministers. He gained considerable note also ;is 
a writer. The following are his principal works : The Evidence and Authority of 



W Ft ITERS OX RELIGION AXD THEOLOGY. 485 

Divine Eevelation; The Terbal Inspiration of the Scriptures: Exposition of the Epis- 
tle to the Romans, etc. In 1S17 and ISIS, he was successful in promoting a revival of 
religion in Geneva, which Las been the means of raising up a school of famous divines 
of an evangelical character, both in Switzerland and in France, — James Alesander 
Haldaxe, 176S-1S51, like his brother Robert, 'v\-as originally in the naval service, and 
quitted it for the purpose of preaching the gospel as an Independent minister. He 
wrote Social Worship of the First Christians ; Forbearance ; Baptism ; Association of 
Believers; Revelation; Man's Responsibility; Inspiration of the Scriptures; The 
Atonement ; Exposition of Galatians, etc, 

Joseph Johx Geuxey, 1788-1847, was a distinguislied. banker, 
pliilanthropist, and preacher of the Society of Friends. 

He was born at Earlham Hall, near Norwich, where the family have possessed great 
influence for two centuries. He was the brother of Mrs. Elizabeth Fry, and shared 
with her in many of her benevolent enterprises. He was a good classical scholar, and 
studied for some time at Oxford, though without being matriculated, as his religious 
principles would not alloAV him to subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles. He made 
missionary tours among the prisons of Great Britain and Ireland, paid three visits to 
the continent, and silent three years in travel in the United States, 

Mr. Gurney wi-ote several valuable works, giving him an honorable rank in the 
field of letters: Essays on the Evidences, Doctrines, and Practical Operations of Chris- 
tianity ; Biblical Notes to Confirm the Deity of Clirist ; Brief Researches on the His- 
tory, Authority, and Use of the Sabbath; Portable Evidences of Christianity; Notes 
on Prisons and Prison Discipline ; Letter to a Friend on Christianity ; Observations 
on the Religious Peculiarities of the Society of Friends ; A "Winter in the "West Indies, 
described in Familiar Letters to Henry Clay ; Puseyism Traced to its Root ; Thoughts 
on Habit and Discipline, etc., etc. 

Mr. Gurney was thrice married, his last wife being an American, ]Miss Eliza P. 
Kirkbride, of Philadeli^hia. 

Mrs. Euzabeth (GrRXEv) Fry, 1TS0-1S45, was a sister of the well-known Joseph 
John Gurney, and was herself equally known bj' her remarkable talents and cultiva- 
tion, and by her philanthropic efforts in behalf of prisoners. She did not write much 
except her letters and journal. The following are her principal public-ations : Obser- 
vations on Visiting French Prisons; Letters, and Journal, contained in her Memoii's. 



Taylor of Ongar. 

Isaac Taylor, 1759-1829, was an engraver in London. In 1786 
he removed into the countrv, settling at Lavenham, Suffolk ; from 1796 
to 1810, he was minister to an Independent congregation at Colchester; 
and from 1811 to 1829, he ministered to the Independent congregation 
at Ongar, in Essex, He is generally known as Taylor of Ongar. 

All of this famih", of whom we have any record, were distinguished for their piety 
and for their literary tastes. The writings of Taylor of Ongar were chiefly the follow- 
ing: Advice to the Teens; Bunyan Explained to a Child; Book of Martyrs for the 
Young; Child's Birthday; Child's Life of Christ; Little Library; Mirabilia, or The 
41- 



486 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Wonders of Nature and Art ; Biography of a Brown Loaf; Beginnings of British Biog- 
raphy ; Beginnings of European Biography ; Scenes in England ; in Europe ; in Asia ; 
in Africa. — Ann Taylor, d. 1830, wife of the preceding, and mother of the celebrated 
writers Isaac, Jane, and Ann, was also herself an author. She wrote Advice to 
Mothers ; Maternal Solicitude for a Daughter's Best Interests ; Practical Hints to 
Young Females; Present of a Mistress to a Young Servant; Family Mansion ; Retro- 
spection; Reciprocal Duties of Parents and Children; and, in connection with her 
daughter Jane, Correspondence between a Mother and her Daughter. — Charles 
Taylor, 1756-1823, brother of Isaac Taylor, was, like him, an engraver in London. 
Charles Taylor did a great service to religions literature by editing an English transla- 
tion of Calmet's Dictionary of the Bible, with Biblical Fragments, in 5 vols., 4to. The 
work has been superseded by later and better dictionaries. But at the time of Cal- 
met's introduction to the English public, it Avas by far the best work on the subject, 
and the undertaking required no little labor and risk. Taylor wrote also Facts and 
Evidences on the Subject of Baptism, and two treatises on Drawing. 

Isaac Taylor. 

Isaac Taylor, LL. D., 1787-1865, son of the preceding Isaac Tay- 
lor, received a more thorough education than the other members of 
the Taylor family, and his writings accordingly take a wider range. 

He studied theology originally, with the intention of preaching, and afterwards 
he studied law, and finally he settled down into the life of a literary recluse, living in 
the country, and sending out, from time to time, the fruits of liis study and of his 
musings. His works are scholarly and thoughtful, though quiet and subdued in tone, 
and have exercised a powerful influence upon the formation of opinion. 

One of his works, The Natural History of Enthusiasm, which was published anony- 
mously, made so deep an impression, that when the chair of Moral Philosophy in the 
University of Edinburgh, the higliest professorship in that institution, became A'acant, 
Dr. Chalmers publicly called upon the unknown author to declare himself, and become 
a candidate for the office. Taylor declared himself accordingly, and came near being 
elected, though the rival candidate was no less a man than Sir William Hamilton. 

Taylor's other works are. The Elements of Thought ; History of the Transmission 
of Ancient Books to Modern Times; The Process of Historical Proof Exempiifie>l and 
Explained ; The Balance of Criminality, or Mental Error Compared Avith Immoral 
Conduct; New Model of Christian Missions; Saturday Evening; Fanaticism ; Spiritual 
Despotism; Physical Theory of Another Life; Home Education; Ancient Christianity 
and the Doctrine of the Oxford Tracts ; Man Responsible for his Dispositions, Opinions, 
and Conduct ; Loyola and Jesuitism ; The Litany and Dissenters ; The Spirit of He- 
brew Poetry, and some others. 

In all this long list of works, there is not one that does not show independent and 
careful thought, or that has not j'ielded fruit in other minds more aggressive than that 
of the author himself. Writings of the quiet and thoughtful kind, like those of Isaac 
Taylor, do their chief work at second hand, in the suggestions which they give to in- 
tellects more daring and energetic than themselves, 

Ann and Jane Taylor. — Ann Taylor, 17.S2-1866, daughter of Isaac Taylor of Ongar, 
and wife of Rev. Joseph Gilbert, was the author, jointly with her sister Jane, of the 
following exceedingly popular works: Original Poems for Infant Minds ; Hymns for 
Infant Minds ; Original Hymns for Sunday-Schools; Rhymes for the Nursery. — Jane 
Taylor, 1783-1824, also daughter of Isaac Taylor of Ongar, was the most distinguished 
of this excellent family, except her brother Isaac. Of the poems written jointly by 



WRITERS ON RELIGION AND THEOLOGY. 487 

the two sisters, the greater part are understood to be from the pen of Jane. Besides 
these, she wrote Display, a Tale ; and Essays in lUiyme on Morals and Manners ; and, 
afttT her death, appeared The Contributions of Q. Q. to a Periodical, and her Memoirs 
and Gorrespondence. Nothing that she wrote, however, prose or verse, has half the 
excellence of the Hymns for Infant Minds. 

Rev. William Jay, 1769-1854, an eminent Dissenting minister, was a native of Tis- 
l)ury, Wiltshire. He began preaching when only fifteen years old, and had preached 
nearly one thousand sermons before he was twenty-one. He became the minister of 
Argyle Chapel at the age of twenty-one, and remained in that position for sixty-two 
years, from 1791 to 1853. He had great celebrity as a pulpit orator. His works have 
been published in 12 vols., Svo. The best known are Morning and Evening Exercises, 
4 vols. These have been extremely popular as a manual of private devotion. The 
others are The Christian Contemplated ; Short Discourses ; Mornings with Jesus ; 
Evenings with Jesus, etc. 

Mrs. Sherwood. 

Mrs. Mary M. Sherwood, 1775-1851, was one of the first to em- 
ploy fiction as a means of religious instruction to the young. She Avas 
to some extent the founder of this important school of writers. 

Mrs. Sherwood was the daughter of George Butt, D. D., Chaplain to George III. She 
was married to her cousin, Captain Henry Sherwood, and went with him in 1803 to 
India, where she zealously aided Henry Martyn and Bishop Corrie in their missionary 
enterprises. The latter years of her life wore spent at Twickenham, England. 

Mrs. Sherwood's Complete Works have been published in 16 volumes, 12mo. She 
was not only a voluminous writer, but to some extent was the founder of a school of 
writers. The great popularity of some of her religious fictions for the young has con- 
tributed largely to the demand for books of this kind which is one of the most notice- 
able features in the religious literature of the day. The present enormous growth 
of Sunday-school story-books sprang from the taste created by the works of Mrs. Sher- 
wood, and of a few other writers of the same kind. 

The two stories of Mrs. Sherwood's which are best known are: Little Henry and 
His Bearer; and Little Lucy and Her Dhaye. Probably not one child in ten, in Eng- 
land or America, has passed through the Sunday-school without reading these two 
stories, which are indeed classics of their kind. 

The Lady of the Manor, a collection of stories in 7 vols., was another exceedingly 
popular work. Some of Mrs. Sherwood's other works are : History of the Fairchild 
Family, 3 vols. ; History of Henry Milner, 3 vols. ; Roxobel, 3 vols., etc. 

Charlotte Elizabeth. 

Mrs. Charlotte Elizabeth Tonna, 1792-1846, under the name 
of Charlotte Elizabeth, published a large number of religious books 
and tracts, which have enjoyed a liigli degree of popularity. 

Mi-s. Tonna was the only daughter of Rev. Michael Browne of Norwich, and was 
married first to Capt. George Phelan, R. A., and after his death to Mr. L. H. J. Tonna. 
A collected edition of her works has been published in 12 vols., 16mo. Those best 
known are : Helen Fleetwood, Judah's Lion, The Siege of Derry, Letters from Ireland, 
Floral Biography, etc. 



488 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Grace Aguilar, 1816-1847. of Jewish descent, but English by birth, and an earnest 
Christian, wrote several works of fiction which have had an extensive popularity. Her 
chief published works are : Home Influence ; Mothers Recompense ; Women of Israel ; 
Records of Israel ; Jewish Faith ; Vale of Cedars : Days of Bruce ; Woman's Friendship : 
Home Scenes; and the Magic Wreath, the last a poetical work. The two works first 
named are the ones best known. "All of these works are highly creditable to the 
literary taste and talents of the writer; and they have a value beyond what the highest 
genius could give — the stamp of truth, piety, and love, and an earnest desire to do 
guod to her fellow-beings.'" — J/?-s. Hales Woman^s Record. 

Caroline Frv, afterwards Mrs. Wilson, 1787-1S46. was bom at Tiinbridge Wells. Her 
works are on moral and religious subjects, and are held in high estimation. The one 
most known is The Listener. The others are Christ our Example: Christ our Law; 
TlieGospelof the Old Testament; The Table of the Lord ; Sabbath Musings; Scripture 
Principles of Education ; A Word to Women ; An Autobiography and Remains, etc. 

V. HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ANTIQUITIES, ETC. 

Lingard. 

John Lingard, D. D., LL. D., 1771-1851, gained for him- 
self lasting fame by his History of England. 

Career. — Lingard was a native of Winchester. He was educated at 
the CathoHc College at Douay, in France. He took orders in the 
Church of Rome, and for the last forty years of his life held a small 
preferment at Hormby, in Lancashu'e, "where he grew old in the 
midst of a community who honored him for his worth." During the 
latter years of his life he received an annual pension of £300 from the 
Queen. It has been reported that the Pope offered to make Lingard 
a Cardinal, and that he declined the honor, lest the duties of the posi- 
tion should interfere with the completion of the great historical work 
upon which he was engaged. The report, however, seems to be with- 
out adequate foundation. 

The work referred to was A History of England, from the First Invasion by the 
Romans to the Accession of William and Mary, in 1668. The work was completed in 
1S30, in 8 vols., 4to. 

Lingard's History has been subjected to severe and searching criticism, and has 
been denounced by some as a partisan %vork. The most deliberate assault was that 
made hj the Edinburgh Review, in which the reviewer charged the author, not only 
with partisanship, but with falsifying the facts of history. The charges M^ere so 
gross, and were put forth with so much boldness, that Dr. Lingard replied in a pam- 
phlet Vindication, of great ability : " His pamphlet is a model of controversial style : 
the scholar, the gentleman, and the divine appear in their best character; the calm 
dignity and the spirited firmness with which the historian repels the coarse language 
and virulent accusations of his antagonist are strong assurances of the rectitude of 
his intentions and the truth of his cause." — Westminster Reriew. 

Dr. Lingard's work, being a history of English affairs :is seen by members of the 
Church of Rome, and being the fruit of original and careful study, with all the ad- 
vantages of modern criticism and research, led many Englishmen doubtless to see. 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 489 

for the first time, that there were two sides to many parts of the story. The earnest 
discussions, liowever, which ensued, have not shaken the author's credit for honesty. 
The utmost that is now alleged is, that in telling- the story he has had a leaning for 
his own side of the question, and that his judgment of men and of affairs is to be 
received with some degree of caution. 

Of the literary merits of his work, there has been but one opinion. All his critics, 
the Edinburgh Reviewer included, award him the highest praise for beauty of style. 

Lingard wrote several other important works. The following are the chief: Cath- 
olic Loyalty Vindicated ; The Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church; English Ver- 
sion of the Four Gospels ; Civil and Religious Principles of the Catholics, etc. 

" Dr. Lingard"s book is the fruit of great industry, learning, and acuteness, directed 
by no ordinary talents. It is written in a clear and agreeable manner. His periods 
are poised, and musical in their cadence, with a variety in their structure that pleases 
without palling on the ear. His style is nervous and concise, and never enfeebled by 
useless epithets, or encumbered with redundant, unmeaning phrases. If it be defi- 
cient in that happy negligence and apparent ease of expression, if it want ' those 
careless inimitable beauties,' which in Hume excited the despair and admiration of 
Gibbon, there is no other modern history with which it may not challenge a com- 
parison. The narrative of Dr. Lingard has the perspicuity of Robertson, with more 
freedom and fancy. His diction has the ornament of Gibbon, without his affectation 
and obscurity." — Edinburgh Review. 

Alison. 

Sir Archibald Alison, 1792-1867, a graduate of the University 
of Edinburgh, is liiglily distinguished as an historian, and as a writer 
on political economy and on politics. He is favorably known also as 
a writer on law. 

Alison's earliest publication was a volume of Travels, 1816. His next works Avere 
Principles of the Criminal Law (1S32), and Practice of the Criminal Law, both of 
which are standard authorities in the Scottish courts. His work on The Principles 
of Population, 2 vols., appeared in 1810, and that on Free-Trade and Fettered Cur- 
rency, in 1847. His Essays, on various historical and political subjects, published 
originally in Blackwood's Magazine, have been repuhlished in 3 volumes. 

The most important by far of all his work.s. however, are his histories. These are 
the History of Europe from the Commencement of the French Revolution to the 
Restoration of the Bourbons (1789-1815), in 14 volumes. 8vo. and the History of 
Europe from 1815 to 1852, in 6 vols. To these shoiald be added his Life of the Duke 
of Marlborough, intended to be read as an introduction to the two preceding. The first 
named of these histories, which came out in 1839—42, gave the writer immediate and 
well-nigh universal celebrity. It went through numerous large editions in England, 
was reprinted in the United States, and was translated into French, German, Arabic, 
and Hindostanee. 

Mr. Alison is a high tory in politics, and this has tinctured to some extent his 
views of public alfairs. Yet he has never been accused, even by his political oppo- 
nents, of perverting the facts of liistory. The Edinbunjli Bevieic says : " Mr. Alison's 
general style is not attractive. It is not. however, at least in the narrative part of it, 
cither feeble or displeasing. Its principal defect is the cumbrous and unwieldy con- 
struction of its sentences, wliich frequently causes them to appear slovenly and ob- 
scure, and sometimes renders their precise meaning doubtful." 



490 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Michael Russell, LL.D., 1781-1848, a learned Scotch Bishop, was boru in Edin- 
burgh, and graduated in 1806 at the University of Glasgow. He wrote A Connection 
of Sacred and Profane History from the Death of Josliua to the Decline of the King- 
doms of Israel and Judah, intended as a complement to the works of Shuckford and 
Prideaux ; A View of Education in Scotland ; Discourse on the Millennium, He wrote 
also the following Histories for the Edinburgh Cabinet Library : Eg^pt, Palestine, 
Barbary States; Nubia and Abyssinia; Polynesia; Iceland, Greenland, and the Faroe 
Islands; History of the Church in Scotland. Bishop Russell was connected with the 
British Critic for twenty years, and with the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana twenty -five 
years. 

Allan Cunningham. 
Allan Cunningham, 1785-1842, made many and valuable con- 
tributions to biography. 

Career. — Cunningham was a Scotchman, of humble birth, and was apprenticed to a 
mason. Not satisfied with this position, he went to London, and became connected with 
the newspaper press. In 1814, he obtained the situation of clerk in the establishment 
of Sir Francis Chantrey the sculptor. This gave him regular occupation and support, 
and at the same time leisure to attend to the literary pursuits for which he had so 
strong an inclination. The relation continued until the death of Sir Francis, which 
was only a year before the death of Cunningham. 

Cunningham's works are partly original, poetry and fiction, and partly those of an 
editorial and antiquarian character. He excelled also in biography and in literary his- 
tory. The following are his principal publications : Sir Michael Scott, a Romance ; 
Paul Jones, a Romance; Lord Roldan, a Romance; The Maid of Elwar, a Romance; 
Traditionary Tales of the Peasantry ; Songs of Scotland, Ancient and Modern ; Sir 
Marmaduke Maxwell, a Dramatic Poem; Lives of the Most Eminent British Painters, 
Sculptors, and Architects, 6 vols.; Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Sir David 
Wilkie, 3 vols.; Biographical and Critical History of the Last Fifty Years (1833); 
The Works of Robert Burns, with Life and Notes ; Poems and Songs. 

Sir Walter Scott was a great admirer of Allan Cunningham. " We breakfasted at 
honest Allan Cunningham's — honest Allan, a leal and true Scotchman of the old 
cast. A man of genius besides, who only requires the tact of knowing when and 
where to stop, to obtain the universal praise which ought to follow it. I look upon 
. . . 'It's hame and it's hame,' and 'A wet sheet and a flowing sea,' as among the 
best songs going. His prose is often admirable; but he is obscure, and overlays his 
meaning, which will not do now-a-days, when he who runs must read." — Sir Walter 
Scott's Diary. 

Peter Ccjxnixgham, 1816-1869, son of Allan Cunningham, had a clerkship in a Gov- 
ernment office, which gave him occupation and support, and yet allowed him leisure 
for literature. His works are: The Life of Drummond of Hawthornden ; The Life of 
Inigo Jones ; The Story of Nell Gwynne ; Handbook for Visitors to Westminster Ab- 
bey ; Handbook of London ; Modern London, etc. Mr. C. edited also in a most schol- 
arly way Goldsmith's Works, Pope's Works, Horace Walpole's Letters, and Johnson's 
Lives of the Poets. 

Alexander Frazee, Tytler, 1747-1813, is important as a writer 
of history. 

He was educated at the University of Edinburgh, where he afterwards became Pro- 
fessor of History and of Greek and Roman Antiquities. In 1802 he was made Justice 



ETC. 491 

of the Court of Sessions, under the title of Lord "Woodhouselee. His works are not 
numerous, and do not possess an equal value with those of his son. They are well 
known, however, and well received. The most widely circulated is the Elements of 
General History, published first in 1801. It has sin^e run through numerous editions 
and received continuations from various hands. His Memoir of the Life of Henry 
Home of Kames is a valuable contribution to Scottish biography. His pamphlet on 
the Union with Scotland met with a large sale at the time of its appearance. 

Besides these more general works he published also a supplement to Lord Karnes's 
Dictionary of Decisions, and a treatise on Military Law and Courts-Martial. 

Patrick Frazee, Tytlee, 1791-1849, a son of Alexander Frazer 
Tytler, attained to still greater eminence as an historian than that 
gained by his father. 

He studied at the University of Edinburgh, and was admitted to the bar (Faculty 
of Advocates), but seems to have relinquished the profession for that of letters. 

He is the author of a number of biographical and historical works of importance. 
Among them are Lives of the Admirable Crichton, of John Wyckliffe, a History of Scot- 
land 1149-1603, Lives of Scottish Worthies, of Sir Walter Raleigh, and of Henry VIII., 
and England under Edward VI. and Mary. 

The younger Tytler was an historian of great independence of view and perseverance 
in research. His works all bear testimony to the care with which he consulted con- 
temporary documents, although it may be regretted at times that he has not worked 
up his materials more carefully. Both Tytlers, father and son, were as popular for 
their amiable qualities as for their writings, and enjoyed the esteem of large circles 
of friends. 

Sharon Turner. 
Sharon I'urner, 1768-1847, made several important contributions 
to history. 

He was born in London, and bred as an attorney. After a few years of successful 
practice, he retired from the profession, and devoted himself to literary pursuits. His 
works are chiefly historical, and are valuable for the research exhibited, although the 
author did not reach the rank of a classical historian. His position is rather that of 
a useful and entertaining antiquarian. 

His publications are : A History of the Anglo-Saxons, comprising the history of Eng- 
land from the earliest period to the Norman Conquest, 4 vols., 8vo; A History of Eng- 
land from the Norman Conquest to the year 1509, the accession of Henry VIIL, 5 vols., 
8vo ; History of the Reign of Henry VIII., 2 vols., 8vo ; History of Edward VI., Mary, 
and Elizabeth, 2 vols., 8vo ; The Sacred History of the World, in Letters to a Son, 3 
vols., 8vo ; An Inquiry respecting the Early Use of Rime, etc. 

Turner's best work was his first, that on the Anglo-Saxon period. By it he has 
connected himself permanently with the literature of that subject. 

William Smyth, 1766-1849, is favorably known by his Lectures 
on Modern History. 

He studied at Cambridge, where in 1801 he was appointed Professor of Modern His- 
tory. His principal works are Lectures on Modern History, and Lectures on the 
French Revolution. Besides these he published a volume of occasional poems and a 
treatise on the Evidences of Christianity. 



492 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Professor Smyth occupied for nearly half a century the important chair of Modern 
History in Cambridge, and was eminently successful as a teacher. It was his merit 
to guide andsliape the historical studies of many generations of young men, who were 
thn.s taught to love and esteem him. The influence which he thereby wielded in the 
liolitical spheres of England was very great. He was called "the pet of successive 
generations of English statesmen." His published Lectures are an admirable collec- 
tion of suggestive ideas and correct judgments, as well as of scholarly research. 



Sir Harris Nicolas. 

Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas, 1799-1848, a native of Wales, 
was distinguished for his antiquarian researches. 

He was intended for the navy, and appointed lieutenant, but abandoned the service 
for the law. His contributions to English archaeology and to the study of early Eng- 
lish literature are very numerous and valuable. Among those of interest to tlie gen- 
eral reader are the Notitia Historise, (the tabular extract from which was separately 
published under the title of the Chronology of History,) and the Battle of Agincourt. 
Sir Nicholas was also the author of Lives of Chaucer, Wyatt, Surrey, and several 
other poets, prefixed to Pickering's Aldine Edition of their works. He began but did 
not finish A History of the British Navy. One of his most celebrated works is A His- 
tory of the Orders of Knighthood of the British Empire. 

Heistry John Todd, 1845, was a prominent antiquarian and 

lexicographer. 

Todd studied at Hertford College, and took orders in the Church of England. He 
is chiefly known by his edition of Johnson's Dictionary, published 1814-1818, which 
has been taken as the basis of Latham's work, recently completed. In addition to 
this, Todd is the author of The Life and Writings of Milton, contained in his edition 
of that writer's works ; of Memoirs of Walton, Bishop of Chester; and of several con- 
troversial pamphlets on the authorship of Eikon Basilike. He considers Bishop Gau- 
den the author. He also contributed some observations on the Metrical Versions of 
tlie Psalms, and on the authorized translation of the Bible, with many other mis- 
cellaneous works. 

Lord Campbell. 

John, Lord Campbell, 1779-1861, was a native of Scotland, and 
a son of Dr. George Campbell, the author of Philosophy of Rhetoric, 

etc. 

Lord Campbell attained great eminence as a lawyer and a statesman ; was raised to 
the peerage, and made Lord Chancellor of England. He wrote The Lives of the Lord 
Chancellors, 7 vols., 8vo, and The Lives of the Chief Justices, 3 vols., besides several 
volumes of Law Reports. His Lives of the Chancellors and of the Chief Justices are 
regarded as of great historical value, besides being written in a pleasing and attractive 
style. "No one possesses better than Lord Campbell the art of telling a story ; of 
passing one that is common-place; of merely suggesting what may be inferred; of 
explaining what is obscure; and of placing in strong light what is ioteresting." — 
i^d. Review. 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 493 

John Britton, 1771-1857, was very eminent as an antiquarian. 

Tlis works are exceedingly numerous, 87 in all; a large proportion of them are su- 
pei'b quartos with costly engravings, l>y artists of celebrity, exhibiting the cathedral 
and other antiquities of England. "'Mr. Britton is not a man of marked originality 
or great mental power; but, as a careful and diligent writer in a branch of literature 
which had been cultivated chiefly by minute antiquarians, he did excellent service in 
calling the attention of the educated public to the long neglected topographical and 
architectural antiquities of England ; there can be little doubt that his elegantly illus- 
trated works have been a chief exciting cause in bringing about the improved state 
of public feeling with reference to our national antiquities." — Knight. 

John Burke, 1786-1848, and Bernard Burke, father and son, 
are the authors of several works on genealogy. 

These writers are, in Great Britain, the acknowledged authority on all subjects 
connected with family descent, and some of their works are enlivened with authentic 
anecdotes of a very entertaining kind, in regard to most of the ancient families in 
Great Britain. "Works: Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Em- 
pire; The Extinct, Dormant, and Suspended Peerage; Knightage of Great Britain; 
Royal Families of Great Britain ; Royal Descents and Pedigrees of Founders' Kin ; 
Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the London Gentry of Great Bi-itain and Ire- 
land; Armory of Great Britain and Ireland ; Heraldic Illustrations; Portrait Gallery 
of French Nobility ; Anecdotes of the Aristocracy ; Family Romance, etc., etc. 

Francis Douce, 1757-1834, was an antiquarian of great learning 
and exactness, and for some time keeper of the MSS. in the British 
Museum. 

Mr. Douce published Illustrations of Shakespeare, 2 vols., 8vo; also. Dissertation on 
The Dance of Death. Dibdin and other competent critics are loud in their praises of 
Mr. Donee's work on Shakespeai-e. But Mr. Douce was so put out by a savage criticism 
in the Edinburgh Review, that he placed in a sealed box all his valuable MSS,, and 
ordered them to be kept unopened in the British Museum till the year 1900. 

Thomas Dudly Fosbrooke, 1770-1842, was a clergyman of the 
Church of England, and an antiquary of good repute. 

Fosbrooke investigated particularly the early monastic life in England. His works 
are: On British Monachism, or Manners and Customs of the Monks and Nuns of Eng- 
land, 4to ; The Economy of Monastic Life as it existed in England, a Poem, with Philo- 
sophical and Archajological Illustrations, 4to; Encyclopaedia of Antiquities and Ele- 
ments of Archaeology, 2 vols., 4to ; Treatise on Arts, Manners, JLanufiictures, and 
Institutions of the Romans; also various histories of particular localities or counties. 

Henry G. Knight, M. P., 1786-1846, gave much time to antiqua- 
rian researches, and also to literary pursuits. 

His chief publications are the following: Architectural Tour in Normandy; The 
Normans in Sicily ; Saracenic and Norman Remains; Ecclesiastical Architecture of 
Italy; Hannibal in Bithynia, a Dramatic Poem; Tour in Spain; Europa Rediviva, a 
Poem ; llderim, a Syrian Tale, in 4 cantos ; Phrosyne, a Grecian Tale ; Alashtar, an 
Arabian Tale; Eastern Sketches in Verse, etc. 

42 



494 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Samuel Weller Singer, 1783-1So8, was a ^Yel]-known English antiqnan- and fditor 
of rare works. Among his editions are Fairfax's Tasso, Sir Tiioma::) More's Life of 
Kichard III., Cavendish's Wolsey, etc. Mr. Singer published also two works of lils 
own, entitled Some Account of the Book printed at Oxford in 14fiS, and Researches 
into the History of Playing-Cards. 



Dibdin. 

Thomas F. Dibdix, D. D., 1776-1847, was the prince of bibliog- 
raphers. 

Dr. Dibdin was nephew to the famous writer of Sea Songs, Charles Dibdin, and son of 
Captain Thomas Dibdin, the one celebrated in the song. " Poor Tom Bowling, the Dar- 
ling of oiir Crew," written by Charles Dibdin, senior. Dr. Dibdin was born in Calcutta, 
and, being left an orphan at tlie early age of four, was sent to England to be educated. 
He selected at first the profession of law, but afterwards took orders in the churcli. 
He is especially celebrated for his bibliographical works. By his writings and pub- 
lications in this line he contributed largely to the extensive bibliomania which pre- 
vailed in England in the early part of the present century. 

Worlis. — Dr. Dibdin's first publication of much note was Bibliomania, issued in 
1809. He next undertook a new and improved edition of Ames's Typographical An- 
tiquities of Great Britain. He originated the idea of the Roxburglie Club, devoted to 
bibliography, and became its Vice-President. He prepared and published The Biblio- 
theca Spenceriaua, a descriptive catalogue of the rare and curious books in the library 
of the Earl of Spencer. This work, with its supplements, extends to 7 vols., super- 
royal Svo. In 1817, he published The Bibliographical Decameron, or Ten Days' Plea- 
sant Discourse upon Illuminated Manuscripts, 3 vols., royal Svo. 

"JThe volumes exceed not only my expectation, but even my imagination. I could 
never have conceived any work so interesting for its decorations. It is surely without 
a rival in the whole history of typography." — W Israeli. 

"If the gods could read, they would never be without a copy of the Decameron in 
their pocket ! " — G. H. Freeling. [N. B. — Mr. Freeling's copy, enlarged with proof- 
plates, etc., was in eleven portly volumes, which would have required rather a big 
pocket.^ 

A few years later. Dr. Dibdin made another book in the same line, A Bibliographical, 
Antiquarian, and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, 3 vols., Svo. It was the 
fruit of nine months" exploration of the continental libraries, and the engravings alone 
cost £5000. Another work of the same kind, but not on such a magnificent scale of 
expenditure, was A Bibliographical, Antiquarian, and Picturesque Tour in the North- 
ern Counties of England and Scotland, 2 vols., Svo. Besides these costly and luxu- 
rious works. Dr. Dibdin wrote several others of great value : Introduction to the Greek 
and Latin Classics ; The Library Companion, a Guide in the selection of a Librarj' ; 
Bibliophobia ; and Reminiscences of a Literary Life, 2 vols., Svo, etc. 

Egbert Watt, M. T)., 1774-1819, is known as the author of the 
Bibliotheca Britannica. 

Dr. Watt was a native of Ayrshire, Scotland. He began life as a farm laborer, but 
worked his way up to high professional eminence. He graduated at Glasgow Univer- 
sity ; was admitted to practice in surgery and pharmacy ; and became finally President 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 4C5 

of the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons at Glasgow. Be*id(!S several medical works, 
he prepared, in conjunction with his sons, tlie great work already named, Bibliotheca, 
Britanuica, or a General Index to British and Foreign Literature, 4 vols., 4to. The 
first two volumes contain the names of Authors, with a complete list of the worlis 
published by each. The last two volumes contain an alphabetical index of Subjects, 
with references to the authors and books where each is treated. It is a work of extra- 
ordinary value, and its preparation cost a prodigious amount of labor. 

William Thomas Lowndes, 1843, a bookseller of London, was noted as a bibli- 
ographer. Works : Bibliographer's Manual, 4 vols., 8vo ; The British Librarian, not 
completed. He was a man very learned and useful in his line. 

William Orme, 1787-1830, a native of Falkirk, Scotland, and a minister of the Con- 
gregational Church, obtained much celebrity by his writings, particularly by those 
on biblical literature; His chief work is Bibliotheca Biblica, a Select List of Books 
on Sacred Literature, with Notices Biographical, Critical, and Bibliographical. Be- 
sides this work, which is a standard authority in its line, he v.'rote copious Memoirs 
of Owen, Baxter, and Urquhart ; Memoirs of the Controversy respecting the Heavenly 
Witnesses, 1 John v. 7 ; and, in connection Mith W. A. Thomson, A History of the Trans- 
lation and Circulation of the Scriptures. 

James Darling, 1797-18G2, a bookseller of London, turned to valuable account his 
long and extensive acquaintance witli books. He published Cyclopajdia Bibliographica, 
a Library Manual of Theological and General Literature, 2 vols. Tol. 1 contains 
Authors and their works, alphabetically arranged; Vol. 2 contains an index of Sub- 
jects, referring to the authors and the works where each subject is discussed. The 
publication is one of uncommon accuracy and value. In theological literature it is 
particularly rich and full. 

Sir John Ba^ro^v. 

Sir John Barrow, 1764-1848, is distinguislied by his excellent ac- 
counts of travels and voyages. 

Barrow wasfor forty years Under-Secretary to the Admiralty, and in that position 
had good opportunities for becoming acquainted with the results of geographical ex- 
ploration, and also for assisting in planning and fitting out voyages of discovery. He 
was for a long time President of the Geographical Society. His principal publications 
were: Travels into the Interior of Africa, 2 vols., 4to ; Travels in China, 4to ; A A'oy- 
age to Cochin China, 4to ; Life and Selections from the Unpublished Writings of Lord 
Macartney. 2 vols., 4to ; History of Voyages to the Polar Regions, 8vo ; Life of Lord 
Howe, Svo ; Life of Lord Anson, with an Outline of Ijis Voyage Round the World, 8vo : 
Life, Voyages, and Exploits of Admiral Sir Francis Drake ; Autobiograpliy, Svo. 

John Barrow, Jr., son of Sir John Barrow, like his father, was a writer of voy- 
ages and travels. His chief publications, extending from 1835 to 1840, are the follow- 
ing: Memoirs of Sir John Barrow, Excursions in the North of Europe; Visit to 
Iceland; Tour Round Ireland ; Tour in Austrian Lombardy. " Mr. Barrow's volume 
is shrewd and lively; liis eyes are sharp, and what he sees he never fails to place in a 
clear and entertaining manner before us." — London Quarterly Review. 

Sir Frederick William Beechet, 1796-1S56, was a distinguished English navigator 



496 WORDSWORTH HIS C0:N^TEMP0R A RIES. 

and explorer, whose published accounts of his observations form a valuable contribu- 
tion to this interesting department of literature. Tliey are Narrative of a Yoyasre 
to the Pacific and Behring's Strait, 2 vols., 4to ; Expedition to the Northern Coasts of 
Africa, 4to; A Voyage of Discovery towards the North Isle, 8vo. 

Capt. Sir Edward Belcher, 1799 , was a distinguished English navigator, and 

a contributor to the literature of the subject. Works : Voyage Round the World, 2 
vols., 8vo; Voyage to the Eastern Archipelago, 2 vols., 8vo; The Last of the Arctic 
Voyages, 2 vols., S\o. 

Sir John Franklin. 

Sir John Franklix, 1786-1847, a distinguished British navigator, 
perished in the frozen ocean near the north pole, in the attempt to 
make a northwest passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. 

Before making his last fatal voyage, Franklin had made two others, the accounts of 
which were published, and constitute a part of the literature of this most interesting 
subject. They are Captain John Franklin's Narrative of a Journey to the North Po- 
lar Sea, 1819-22, 4to ; Capt. Jolai Franklin's Narrative of a Second Expedition to the 
Shores of the Polar Sea, 1825-27, 4to. 

James Bailme Fraser, 1783-1856, a native of Scotland, spent 
several years in wild adventure as a traveller in -remote regions of 
Asia, and on his return home published an account of his travels in a 
series of exceedingly interesting volumes. 

Works : Journal of a Tour through part of the Snowy Range of the Himalaya 
Mountains, 1820, 4to; Journey into Khorasan, 1821-22, 4to; Travels and Adventures 
in the Persian Provinces on the Soutliern Banks of the Caspian Sea, 18'.^6, 4to ; A 
Winter Journey from Constantinople to Tehran, in 1838, 2 vols., Svo; Travels in Koor- 
distan and Mesopotamia, in 1840, 2 vols., Svo. Mr. Fraser published also a number of 
romances founded on his oriental experiences. 

Capt. Hall. 

Capt. Basil, Hall, K. N., 1788-1844, a native of Edinburgh, was 
a writer of voyages and travels which had extensive circulation. 

Hall entered the navy at the age of fourteen, and was in active service in many 
parts of the globe. His works are the following: Voyage to the West Coast of Corea; 
Travels in America; Journal on the Coasts of Chili. Peru, and Mexico ; Fragments 
of A'oyages and Travels; Occasional Poems, and Miscellanies, etc. Captain Hall's 
" Trjivels in America " produced at the time a great deal of irritation in the United 
States. 

James Silk Buckingham, 1786-1855, was a man of no little celeb- 
rity as a writer, lecturer, traveller, and advocate of social reforms. 

He was a Member of Parliament, and while there made earnest efforts for legislation 
against drunkenness, and other social and political evils. His chief works, however, 
are Travels, as follows : In Palestine, 2 vols. ; Among the Arab Tribes, 4to ; In Meso- 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITEES. 497 

potamia, 4to; In AssjTia, MeJia, and Persia, 4to; Belgium, Rhine, and Switzerland. 2 
vols.; Trance, Piedmont, and Lombardy, 2 vols.; America, Historical, Statistic, and 
Descriptive, — Northern States, 3 vols. ; Eastern and Western States, 3 vols.; Southern 
States, 2 vols.; British Provinces, 1 vol.; Autobiography, 2 vols. 

William Henry Bartlett, 1809-1854, is widely known as a travelling artist. His 
views of scenery in different countries, in some fourteen or fifteen different volumes, 
mostly 4to, were accompanied with letter-press descriptions by Willis, Miss Pardoe, 
and by his fellow-traveller, William Beattie, M. D., and sometimes by himself. They 
are among the finest works of this kind that have appeared. — William Beattie, M. D., 
is particularly known as the fellow-traveller and biographer of Bartlett the arjtist, 
and as his assistant in the literary portions of most of the volumes of Tiews of differ- 
ent countries published by the latter. Dr. Beattie's publications are: Residence in 
Germany; The Pilgrim in Italy; The Castles and Abbeys of England: Scotland Illus- 
trated; The Wildeniess Illustrated; The Paiiube, Its History and Scenery; Life and 
Letters of Dr. Campbell; Heliotrope, or Pilgrim in Pursuit of Health. 

VI. MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 

Arnold of Rugby. 

Thomas Arnold, D. D., 1795-1842, is known the world 
over as "Arnold of Rugby," from the great educational 
work which he performed in that renowned school. 

Arnold was Head Master of Eugby from 1827 to the time of his 
death, and during the last two years of his life he was also Kegius 
Professor of Modern History in Oxford. 

Ilis principal works are: History of Rome (unfinished); The Later Roman Com- 
monwealth; Lectures on Modern History ; and Sermons (3 vols.). He published also 
an edition of Tliucydides, showing fine critical power and ripe scholarship. 

The great work of Arnold, however, was the religious life which he infused into the 
Rugby School, and through it, by example, into the other great public schools of Eng- 
land where most of the sons of high-born Englishmen are educated. This work he 
accomjilished, partly by the singular vigor and force of his intellectual character, but 
mainly by the thorough, inwrought religiousness of his own life. It was what he 
was, quite as much as what he did, that made him a power among his boys. Another 
circumstance that contributed greatly to the quickening power of Arnold's life and 
teachings was that his religion was entirely free from asceticism and from sham. 
While of the deepest and most earnest kind, it was yet a religion of sunshine and 
health and of high physical activity and enjoyment. 

Arnold's Life and Correspondence, by Stanley, has been published in 2 vols. But 
the best picture of the daily life of the great Head Master is to be found in Tom 
Brown's School-Days at Rugby, by Hughes. 

There are some striking points of likeness between Arnold and Milton. "There is 
the same purity and directness about them both : the same predominance of the 
graver, not to say, sterner elements; tlie same confidence, vehemence, and elevation. 
They both so lived in their 'great Task-Master's eye' or, to verify Bacon's observation, 
made themselves of kin to God in sjiirit, and raised their nature by means of a higher 
nature than their own." — Ed.iuburgh Review. 

42* 2 G 



408 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

"The most stronglj" marked feature of his intellect was the strength and rlear- 
ness of liis percej)tions. It seemed the possession of an inward light so intense that 
it penetrated on the instant every subject laid before him, and enabled him to grasp 
it with the vividness of sense and tlie force of reality. Hence, what was said of his 
religious impressions may be used to characterize his intellectual operations: 'he 
knew what others only believed ; he saw what others only talked about.' " — Kniylit. 

This wonderful clearness of his own apprehension, joined to a native vehemence 
of temper, made him impatient of contradiction, and led him frequently into contro- 
versy on public questions. 

Matthew Arnold, 1822 , is son of Dr. Thomas Arnold of 

Eugby, and Professor of Poetry in the University of Oxford. 

Prof. Arnold has had every advantage of education which the most celebrated schools 
of England could give him, having passed successively through Winchester, Rugby, 
and Oxford, and he has used his opportunities in a manner worthy of his distinguished 
parentage. Though at times erratic in his opinions, and hence not entirely safe as a 
literary guide, his intellectual activity is great, and he is constantly putting forth 
ideas which stimulate inquiry. 

His publications are : TJie Strayed Reveller and Other Poems ; Empedocles in Etna 
and Other Poems ; Merope, a Tragedy ; Essays in Criticism ; Culture and Anarchy ; 
Study of Celtic Literature : Popular l-ducation of France ; Schools and Universities of 
the Continent; Friendship's Garland ; St. Paul and Protestantism. 

Archibald Alisox, 1757-1839, father of the historian, is chiefly 
known by his work on the Nature and Principles of Taste, first pub- 
lished in 1790. 

Alison published also a Memoir of Lord Woodhouselce, and a number of Sermons. 
His work on Taste has attained a wide celebrity, and is one of the standard authori- 
ties on that subject. The Edinburgh Review says of it, " We can hardly help envying 
the talent by which Mr. Alison has clothed so much wisdom in so much beauty, and 
made us find in the same work the highest gratification of taste and the noblest les- 
sons of virtue." 

Taylor the Platonist. 

Thomas Taylor, 1758-1835, acquired distinction by his devotion 
to Greek literature, and especially to the works of Plato. 

While a young man, Taylor was chiefly engaged in business. He passed the last 
forty years of his life in retirement, preparing his translations from the Greek. Taylor 
was a sincere lover of the Greek language and philosophy, but his scholarship was by 
no means equal to his enthusiasm. His translations are very numerous ; some rather 
good, the majority poor, and all anathematized by each successive generation of 
scholars and reviewers. The principal are The Works of Plato (in which Taylor was 
assisted by Sydenham), and The Works of Aristotle. These voluminous contribti- 
tions to the history of philosophy had some value, not because of their intrinsic merits, 
but because until lately nothing better had taken their place. They are very care- 
lessly executed, and full of errors. Taylor seems to have regarded it as his life-mission 
to reproduce in English all that related to the Platonic and Xeo-Platonic scliool. The 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 499 

complete list of his works covers uearly forty translutions, on all subjects, from the 
Hymns of Orpheus to the Golden Ass of Apuleius. The translation of Plato by Prof. 
Jowett, completed in 1871, supersedes entirely that by Taylor. 

Taylor of Norwich. 

WiLL,iAM Taylor, 1765-1836, was for a long while the chief ex- 
ponent of German literature in England. 

His works have the merit of being the first to show to the English public the im- 
portance of the then young but rapidly growing poetry of Germany. Mr. Taylor was 
editor of the Norwich Iris, and published some miscellaneous works. He is exclu- 
sively known now, however, by his translations of Burgers Leonore and Lessing's 
Nathan the Wise, and his Historic Survey of German Poetry. In this last-mentioned 
work he has incorporated all his previously published translations. As a critic and 
translator, Mr. Taylor has been superseded, and his history, published nearly fifty 
years ago, is obviously incomplete. Still, the services Vvhich he rendered in making 
known to his countrymen the rising stars of German thought, are too important to 
be forgotten. 

Mrs. Sarah Austin, 1793-1867, daughter of William Taylor of 
Korwich, an accomplished and scholarly woman, also did much to 
bring " the finest types of the German mind to the knowledge and ap- 
preciation of the English reader." 

Of her translation of Kauke's histories, Macaulay says, " it is such as might be ex- 
jjected from the skill, the taste, and the scrupulous integrity of the accomplished lady 
who, as interpreter between the mind of Germany and the mind of Britain, has already 
deserved so well of both countries.'" Her works are : Characteristics of Goethe, 3 vols. : 
Collections of Fragments from the German Prose Writers; Sketches of Germany from 
1760 to 1814 ; Ranke's History of tlie Reformation in Germany ; Ranke's History of the 
Popes : Considerations on National Education ; Letters on Girls' Schools ; Story without 
an End; Selections from the Old Testament. 

John Sterling, 1806-1844. a native of Scotland, studied at Cambridge, but did not 
take his degree. After residing some years in London, as a writer for the periodical 
press, chiefly for The Times, he took orders in the Church of England, and became 
curate to Charles Julius Hare, his former college tutor. During the last few years 
of his life his health was extremely feeble, and he died prematurely at the age of 
thirty-eight. 

Sterling's literary record is scarcely commensurate with his reputation, which has 
been secured for him by two biographies, one by Hare, the other by Thomas Carlyle. 

Like many young Englishmen of the present century, he seems to have been a man 
of great intellectual powers and keen sympathy, but he has produced comparatively 
little. His pai)ers, essays, and tales have been collected and published in two volumes. 
His poems were published in 1839. The finest of them is perhaps The Sexton's Daugh- 
ter, pronounced by Moir "a striking lyrical ballad." His novel of Arthur Coningsby 
was unsuccesstul. 

Robert Plumer Ward, 1765-1846, acquired considerable repu- 
tation as a writer, his works being chiefly on political and international 
subjects. 



500 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Ward was the son of an Englisli merchant living at Gibraltar. lie was educated at 
Oxford, and admitted to the English bar. He occupied several political office.^ of dis- 
tinction, became one of the Lords of tlie Admiralty, and sat for a number of j-ears in 
Parliament. 

His works arrange themselves into two sharply-defined classes: those of learning 
and those of fiction. Among the former are An Inquiry into the Foundation and His- 
tory of the Law of Nations, from the Times of the Greeks and Romans to the Age of 
Grotius; A Treatise on the Relative Rights and Duties of Belligerents and Neutrals ; 
An Essay on Contraband; an Inquiry into tlie Way in which the Different Wars of 
Europe have commenced during the Last Two Centuries; and An Historical Essay 
into the Character and Precedents of the Revolution of 1(588. His works of fiction 
are : Tremaine, or the Man of Refinement ; De Tere, or the Man of Independence ; Le 
Clifford, or the Constant Man ; Illustrations of Human Life ; and Pictures of the Worhl 
at Home and Abroad. The last two are collections of tales. 

Ward's works of fiction enjoyed a fair share of reputation in their day, but are now 
little read. They can scarcely be called dull, and may even be looked upon as " clever," 
but do not evince any real force of character. His legal and historical treatises are 
w^anting in profound study and grasp of intellect, but are so pleasingly written as to 
call from Canning the satirical remark that " his law-books were as pleasant as nov- 
els, and his novels as dull as law-books." 



The Duke of ^^^ellington. 

Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, 1769-1852, holds a 
place in letters by the remarkable literary excellence of his military 
despatches. 

Wellington was born in Ireland, and educated at Eton and at the French military 
school at Angers. He entered the army, and, after sitting in the Irish Parliament for 
a number of years, joined the English army then fighting in India. Here he rose 
rapidly to distinction, and was then called home to take command of the campaign in 
Spain against Napoleon. His success in Spain and France and at Waterloo, and his 
subsequent political labors and distinction, are too well known to call for mention in 
this place. 

As an author, the Duke is known exclusively by his General Orders and Despatches, 
published by Lt.-Col. Gurwood, and the Supplemeutarj' Yolumes and Civil Corres- 
pondence published by the Duke's son. These volumes are not only intrinsically Aal- 
uablefrom the information which they give concerning the Duke's campaigns and 
policy, but they are interesting in point of style. The Duke, although professing to 
be a mere soldier, possessed the additional talent of writing with nervous force and 
even elegance. His despatches are a model of straightforward, manly English. Like 
his speeches, they contain nothing put in for effect, but are clear and straight to the 
point, and command our interest. They are also singularly modest, betraying no 
restless craving for fame or glory. In this respect they present a marked contrast to 
Napoleon's notorious bulletins, which often read like theatrical declamations rather 
than the responsible statements of a superior to his subordinates. 

KiCHARD CoLLEY Wellesley, Earl of Mornington and Marquis 
of Wellesley, 1760-1842, the elder brother of the Duke of Welling- 
ton, has likewise some reputation as a writer. 



MISCELLAXEOUS ^"RITEES. 501 

Welleslcy studied at Eton and Oxford, and entered the Indian service. In 1787 he 
■^as made Goveruor-General of India, and afterwards held the high offices of Ambas- 
sador to Spain, Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. The >Iar- 
quis was an able statesman and administrator, but less successful as a writer than his 
brother. His style is ambitious and verbose. 

During his lifetime, Wellesley published two works, the one containing his Des- 
patches and OflBcial Correspondence while Governor-General of India, the other his 
Correspondence and Despatches while Ambassador to the Spanish Junta. After his 
death appeared three volumes of Memoirs and Correspondence, containing many 
papers not before published. He also published privately a volume of English, Latin, 
and Greek Poems. Wellesley's Correspondence is of course extremely valuable for 
tlie light which it throws upon the political events of the great Napoleonic wars of 
England, and as such has been much considted by histoi'ians. 

B-isiL MoxTAGr, 1770-1851, son of the Earl of Sandwich, is chiefly 
known by his edition of the works of Bacon. 

Montagu studied at Cambridge, and subsequently rose to high distinction at the 
English bar. Mr. Montagu published a great number of reports and legal treatises, 
chiefly upon the law of Bankruptcy. As an author he is known almost exclusively, 
however, by his edition of the works of Lord Bacon. This is the most comx^lete 
edition as yet, and is accompanied by much illustrative matter and a Life of Bacon by 
the author. Mr. Montagu was a zealous advocate of legal reform. His exertions, 
combined with those of Romilly, Wilberforce, Mackintosh, and others, effected a repeal 
of the death penalty for minor offences. 

John CLAnurs Loudox, 1783-1843, attained distinction as a writer 
on horticulture and agriculture. 

Loudon Avas a Scotchman. He resided mostly in London, and devoted himself ex- 
clusively to studying and experimenting upon his favorite subject. His writings have 
produced a great effect upon farming and gardening. His principal publications are 
the following : On Laying out Public Squares ; Country Residences ; Hot-Houses ; 
Formation of Gardens; Encyclopgedia of Cottage. Earm, and Tillage Architecture; 
Encyclopaedia of Plants; Encyclopredia of Agriculture, etc. — Mrs. James Loudox, 
180S-1S58, wife of the preceding, wrote several pleasing books on subjects connected 
with her husband's pursuits : The Lady"s Plower-Garden and Ornamental Plants ; The 
Lady"s Companion to the Flower-Garden; Botany for Ladies ; Entertaining Natural- 
ist; Tear-Book of Natural History; Glimpses of Nature; British Wild Flowers; 
Toung Naturalists' Journal, etc.. etc. She has written on other themes also; and it 
was a novel of hers. The Mummy, that led Mr. Loudon to seek her acquaintance, and 
ask her hand in marriage. 

Granville Penn. 

Geaxtiille Penn, 1761-1844, son of Thomas, and grandson of 
AVilliani Penn, was born in Philadelphia, but liTed in England. 

Mr. Penn was for some time a clerk in the English War Department. He was a 
man of letters, and wrote several works worth}' of mention: A Christian's Survey of 
All the Principal Events and Periods of the World; The Bioscope, or the Dial of Life 
Explained; An Examination of the Primary Argument of the Iliad; Remarks ou the 



502 WORDSWORTH — HIS COX TEMPORARIES. 

Eastern Origination of Mankind and of the Arts of Cultivated Life ; Comparative Ks- 
timate of tlie Mineral and Mosaical Geologies ; Memorials of the Professional Life and 
Times of Sir William Penn, Knight; also, Annotations on various parts of the Bible. 
— John Pexn, LL. D., 1759-1834, was a brother of Granville Penn, and for some time 
Proprietary and Hereditary Governor of the Province of Pennsylvania. He was, like 
his brother, a scholarly man, and wrote several works : The Battle of Eddington, or 
British Liberty-, a Tragedy, Critical, Poetical, and Dramatic Works, 2 vols. : Poems, 
consisting of original works, imitations, and translations ; Moral Odes of Horace, 
translated, etc. 

Mudie. 

Egbert Mudie, 1777-1842, a Scottish naturalist, wrote and com- 
piled a large number of works. 

The following are some of Mr. Mudie's publications: The Modem Athens (Edin- 
burgh): Babylon the Great (London) ; British Naturalist; Guide to the Observation 
of Nature; Feathered Tribes of the British Islands; Moral Philosophy; The Ele- 
ments, the Heaven, the Earth, the Air, the Sea: The Seasons, Spring. Summer, Au- 
tumn, Winter ; Man in his Physical Structure, etc. Mr. Mudie, in his numerous 
works, studied popular utility rather than fame. 

Edward Smkdlet, 1789-1836, graduated at Cambridge with distinguished honors 
in 1809. He Avrote with great ability, both in prose and verse. At the time of his 
death, and for several years before, he was editor of the Encjxlop^dia Metropolitana. 
He contributed also articles on French Biography, and on English and Roman Liter- 
ature, to the Penny Cyclopsedia. Death of Saul and Jonathan, Jephtha, The Marriage 
of Cana, and Saul at Endor, were Seatonian Prize Poems. Some of his other poems 
are Jonah, and Prescience or the Secrets of Divination. Mr. Smedley wrote also Ile- 
ligio Clerici, Sketches from Tenetian History, History of the Reformed Religion in 
France, History of France. After his death, his Poems and Correspondence, with a 
Memoir, appeared. 

Laciy Stanhope. 

Lady Hester Stanhope, 1766-1839, was the daughter of Charles, 
third Earl of Stanhope, and niece of William Pitt. 

When about twenty years of age, Lady Stanhope took up her residence with her 
uncle, and assisted him in his correspondence, until his death in 1806. In 1810 she 
turned her back upon England in disgust, and began an oriental tour, settling down 
in her villa, on Mount Lebanon. Here she assumed the manners, costume, and par- 
tially, at least, the religion of the Arabs. She was regarded with superstitious rev- 
erence by the surrounding Bedouins, and received the title of Queen of the Wilder- 
ness. She was visited in her retirement by several distinguished travellers, among 
them Lamartine. Her Memoirs, as related by Herself in Conversation with her Phy- 
sician, were published in 1845. The completion of these memoirs, under the title 
The Seven Years' Ti-avels of Lady Hester Stanhope, appeared in 1546. 

Maria Jane Jewsbury, 1800-1833, was one of the pleasing lady 
writers of this period. 

Miss .Tewsbury was a native of Warwickshire. She was married, in 1833, to the Rev. 
Wm. Fletcher, missionary to India, and died soon after arriving at Bombay. Besides 



MISCELLAXEOUS WRITERS. 503 

many articles contributed to the London Athenaeum and never collected, the follo-vv- 
ing Avorks have been published in book-form: Phantasmagoria, or Sketches of Life 
and Literature, Letters to the Young, Lays of Leisure Hours, and Three Histories. 

Mr. and Mrs. Hoflaxd. — Thomas Christopher Ilofland, 1777-1.843, was a well-known 
landscape paiuter, and an enthu.^iastic disciple of Izaak Walton. Besides his cele- 
brated illustrated Description of Wliite Knights, a country-seat of the Duke of Marl- 
borough, he published, in 1S39, The British Angler's Manual, pronounced to be the most 
comprehensive work on the subject. — Mrs. Hofland, 1770-1844, wife of the preceding, 
furnished the letter-press of her husband's Description of White Knights. She pub- 
lished, in 1805, a small volume of Poems, and subsequently a series of about seventj' 
X(.vels and Tales, which were widely read, and reached the enormous circulation of 
three hundred thousand. 

Hox. AXD Eev. William Herbert, D. C. L., 1778-1847, son of 
the Earl of Carnarvon, gained distinction as a scholar and a writer. 

Herbert was educated at Eton and Oxford. He began his career as a Doctor of 
Medicine, and had distinguished success. He then entered Parliament, and, after a 
brilliant career in the House of Commons, took holj' orders. His literary labors 
were divided between classical scholarship and works of a more general character. 
Among the latter may be named the following: Select Icelandic Poetry, translated 
from the original, with Notes ; Helga, a Poem, in 7 cantos ; Hedin, or The Spectre of 
the Tomb, a tale from Danish history; The Wizard Wanderer of Jutland, a Tragedy; 
Julia Montalbin, a Tale ; The Guabiba, a Tale ; Attila, the King of the Huns, or The 
Triumph of Christianity, an Epic Poem ; Attila and his Predecessors, an Historical 
Treatise; Christian, a Poem; Miscellaneous Works, 2 vols. He was one of the early 
contributors to the Edinburgh Keview. 

Shoberl. 

Frederick Shoberl, 1775-1 853, was a very fertile writer of this 
period. 

Shoberl was a native of London, and was educated at the Moravian School at Ful- 
neck, Yorkshire. He was a prolific writer, his works, original and translated, num- 
bering between thirty and forty. Besides this, he was largely engaged in periodiciil 
literature, both as proprietor and contributor. Of his original works, the following 
may be named : The World in Miniature, 12 vols. ; History of Persia ; Present State 
of Christianity ; History of Our Times ; Frederick the Great; Spirit of Popery, etc. 
Among his translations, chiefly from the German and the French, the following are 
worthy of note : Essay on Solitude, from Zimmerman ; Travels in Greece, from Chateau- 
briand; Travels in the Caucasus, from Klaproth ; Studies of Nature, from St. Pieire, 
4 vols., 8vo ; History of the French devolution, from Thiers, 5 vols., Svo, etc. 

William Hoxe, 1779-I?42, a London publisher, and subsequently an Independent 
minister in Eastcheap, published several cui-ious works. Among these were The 
Apocryphal New Testament, and many political pieces. One of the latter, The Politi- 
cal House that Jack Built, ran through fifty editions. Hone is generally known, 
however, by his three miscellaneotis publications. The Every nlay Book, The Table 
Book, and Tiie Year Book. All three — but especially the first — are amply charac- 
terized in Lamb's lines : 



504 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

"I like j'ou and your book, ingenious Hone, 
In whose cap:icious, uU-emliracing leaves, 
The very mairuw of tradition's shown, 
And all that History — much that Fiction — weaves. 

" By every sort of taste your work is graced ; 
Yast stores of modern anecdote we find, 
With good old stor}' quaintly interlaced: — 
The theme as various as the reader's mind. 

" Dan Phoebus loves your book : trust me, friend Hone ; 
The title only errs, he bids nie say ; 
For, while such art, wit, reading, there are shown. 
He swears 'tis not a work of every dau''' 

Charles Aemitage Brown has written an exceedingly ingenions and able bo'ik on 
Shakespeare's Autobiographical Poems, being an exposition of the Sonnets, and un- 
dertaking to show what light they throw upon the personal character of Shakespeare. 

Classical Literature. 

Several scholars and writers of this period acquired distinction by 
their labors in the promotion of classical literature. Among these, the 
following may be named : 

The Yaipts. — Eichard Vai.pt, D.D., 17^4-1836, was born in the Isle of Jersey, 
and educated at Oxford. He -was for nearly forty years Head Master of the Beading 
Grammar-School. lie published Poetical Blossoms, and Sermons, besides numerous 
school-books. The latter wei'e Latin Grammar, Yocabulary, First Exercises, and Dia- 
logues ; Greek Grammar, and Delectus; Xew English Reader; Mythology. — Rev. F. 
E. J. Yalpy, youngest son of Richard, and his successor in the Reading Grammar- 
School, published Greek Yocabulary, Exercises, Delectus, Second Delectus, Etymology ; 
Latin Delectus, Second Delectus. Etymology; Gradus ad Paruassum. — Abraham J. 
Yalpy, 1786-1854:, second son of Richard, was educated at Oxford, and -was a thorough 
classical scholar. He v.-rote little, but was so extensively known by his classical pub- 
lications that a note of him and of his work seems proper. His chief publications 
were: An Edition of Delphin Classics, in 141 vols., Svo ; Stephens's Greek Thesaurus, 
8 vols., fol.; The Classical Journal, from 1810 to 1829, 40 vols. : Family Classical Li- 
brary, 52 vols.; Shakespeare, with Plates, 15 vols.; and annotated editions of many 
other authors, chiefly Greek and Latin. His two heaviest undertakings. The Delphin 
Classics and The Greek Thesaurus of Stephens, were criticized with merciless severity 
by Bishop Blomfield in the London Quarterly Review. — Rev. Edw.ard Yalpt, 17''i.3- 
1832, brother of Richard, was educated at Cambridge; assisted Richard several years 
in the school at Reading; and became Master of the Grammar-School at Norwich. 
He published an edition of the New Testament with Notes ; also, of The Septuagint, 
and of Homer's Iliad: Rules and Exercises for an Elegant Latin Style: A Concise 
Yiew of the Doctrine of the Greek Article, being an abridgment of Middleton's 
work. 

George Dyer, 1755-1841, antiquary and divine, was a native of London. lie was a 
clerg3'man of the Baptist Church, and preached for some time in Oxford. Afterwards 
he went to London and employed himself chiefly in literary pursuits. He labored 
for eleven years on Yalpy's edition of the Classics, 141 vols., Svo, a large part of the 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 505 

work on them being done by him. He edited the Greek Testament and two Plays of 
Euripides. He wrote A History of the University of Cambridge, 2 vols., 8vo ; Poems 
and Critical Essays on Poetry, 2 vols.; Poetics, 2 vols., etc. 

Edmund Henry Barkek, 1788-1839, was a classical scholar, whose indefatigable 
hiboi-s and somewhat ponderous erudition made him alternately the butt and the 
marvel of his age. He undertook a revised edition of Stephens's Thesaurus of the 
Greek Language. The work was so swelled by the indiscriminate additions of the 
editor that it reached on completion the enormous size of eight folio volumes of com- 
pact, cioseiy printed matter. This vast work is comparatively worthless for the want 
of condensation and method. What one wants to find may be there, but it is next to 
impossible to find it. Mr. Barker contributed largely to the Classical Journal, and 
edited various works. 

Charles James Blomfield, 1786-1857, Bishop of London, was very eminent as a 
classical scholar. Bishop Blomfield's learned contributions to the Museum Criticum, 
and his editions of iEschylus and Callimachus, have given him a permanent place 
among the great scholars of whom England has to boast. Of like character are his 
occasional articles on classical subjects in the London Quarterly, such as his famous 
review of Barker's edition of Stephens's Thesaurus, demolishing at a blow the painful 
labors of ten tedious years. Blomfield is another proof, if any were needed, that pro- 
found and critical learning is no bar to excellence in writing good English and on 
common subjects. Besides these learned labors which have been named, he addressed 
himself to the popular wants in works of a miscellaneous character connected with 
his sacred calling. Among these may be named A Dissertation upon the Traditional 
Knowledge of a Promised Redeemer; Lectures on the Gospel of St. John ; Lectures 
on the Acts of the Apostles; A Letter on the Present Neglect of the Lord's Day; 
Manual of Family Prayers ; Private Devotion. 

Thomas Mitchell, 17S3-184o, a native of London, and a graduate of Oxford, was one 
of the eminent Greek scholars of this century. Mr. Mitchell's labors were almost ex- 
clusively in one direction, namely, the presentation of the claims of Aristophanes to 
the English scholar. To this end he published translations of many of the plays of 
Aristophanes, afterwards followed up by annotated editions of the originals, and also 
a series of articles upon Aristophanes and Athenian society of that time. He also 
edited the plays of Sophocles. His translations of Aristophanes rank deservedly high, 
and show themselves to be the work of one who is thoroughly master of his subject. 



Other Lines of Scholarship. 

Some of the writers in otlier lines of scholarship akin to the classi- 
cal are deserving of mention. Among them are the following : 

Henry Francis Gary, 1772-184:4, is known chiefly as the translator of Dante. He 
■was Assistant Librarian in the British Museum, and had a pension from the Govern- 
ment of £-00 a year. "Works: A Translation of Dante's Inferno, Purgatorio, and 
Paradise, into English blank verse, with Notes ; A Translation of the Birds of Aris- 
tophanes, and of the Odes of Pindar; Lives of English Poets, from Johnson to Kirke 
"White, intended as a continuation of Johuson's Lives ; The Early French Poets ; Odea 
and Sonnets, etc. Mr. Cary was buried in the Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey. 

William Stewart Rose, 1775-1843, a native of Scotland, and a friend of Sir Walter 

Scott, is well known as a translator from Italian and French. His chief works are 

a translation of Amadis de Gaul, and Partenopex de Blois, and of Ariosto's Orlando 

Furioso and Bemi's Orlando Inamorato, These renderings are probably the best that 

43 



506 WORDSWORTH — HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

the English language possesses. In addition to them he published a few original 
works, among them Letters from the North of Italy, and a volume of rhymes. 

Hugh James Rose, 1795-1838, brother of the preceding, graduated at Cambridge in 
1817, and rose to various ecclesiastical dignities, among them that of Professor of Di- 
vinity in the University of Durham. He is chiefly known as the projector of A New 
Biographical Dictionary, 12 vols., 8vo, which was begun by him and completed after 
his decease. He originated also the British Magazine, and was its first editor ; and 
was for some time the editor of the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana. His other publica- 
tions are niimerous, but are mostly Sermons or single Discourses. 

William Peter, 1788-1853, a native of Cornwall, studied at Oxford, was British 
Consul for Philadelphia from 1840 to 1853. Mr. Peter was a man of ripe scholarship. 
He ti'anslated Schiller's Mary Stuart, Maid of Orleans, AVilliam Tell, The Agamemnon 
of iEschylus, and some miscellaneous Greek and Latin pieces, and also published the 
Memoirs of Sir Samuel Romilly. 

Joseph Bosworth, LL. D., 1788 , a well-known philologist, has written some 

works on popular subjects, but is chiefly distinguished by his labors in bringing a 
knowledge of the Anglo-Saxon language and literature within the reach of ordinary 
English scholars. His chief publications in this department have been : An Anglo- 
Saxon and English Dictionary; An Anglo-Saxon Grammar; and printed editions 
of various Anglo-Saxon documents, such as King Alfred's Orosius, and his Yoyage of 
Othere and Wolfstan. 

George Crabb, 1778-1554, is widely known by his work on English Synonyms. He 
was a graduate of Oxford University. He devoted himself to works of a philological 
character, and though really not possessing very clear ideas on the philosophy of 
language, yet by his Industry he accumulated and has given in his works a valuable 
stock of materials for use. His works are : English Synonyms ; Universal Historical 
Dictionary; Dictionary of General Knowledge; New Pantheon, or Mythology of all 
Nations; German Grammar for Englishmen ; English Grammar for Germans. "As 
an etymologist, Mr. Crabb seems to have some dictionarj'^ knowledge of many lan- 
guages ; but to be unacquainted with the philosophy, or history even, of language in 
general. However, with all his incompetency for the office of Synonymist, he has 
most industriously brought together a mass of materials and observations, which, 
under judicious selection, in more skilful hands, may hereafter essentially contribute 
to the science of English literature." — London Quarterly. 

Alexander Crombie, LL. D., 1760-1842, a Scotch Presbyterian preacher and school- 
master in London, wrote Etymology and Sj'utax, containing some acute remarks 
on English Grammar ; Philosophical Necessity ; Natural Theology ; and Letters on 
the Agricultural Interest. 



Art -Writers. 

A considerable number of those who liave gained distinction as 
artists, have written npon topics connected with their profession. 
Among tliese tlie following may be named : 

Benjamin Egbert Hatdon, 1786-1846, published Lectures on Fresco; Lectures on 
Painting and Design ; and, in conjunction with Hazlitt, a volume of Essays on Paint- 
ing and the Fine Arts. 

Sir Charles L. Eastlake, 1793-1865, President of the Royal Academy, wrote Con- 
tributions to the Literature of the Fine Arts; Materials for a History of Oil Painting; 
Translation of Goethe's Theory of Colors, etc. 



MISCELLANEOUS WRITERS. 507 

Sir Martin Archer Shee, 1770-1850, a native of Ireland, removed to London and 
became a member and finally President of the Royal Academy. Shee was a portrait 
painter, but did not rise to the first rank in his art. Besides his paintings he pub- 
lished several poetical and miscellaneous works, also of inferior value. Two of them 
are entitled Rhymes on Art, and Elements of Art. Alasco is a tragedy, which was not 
put upon the stage. His two novels are Harry Calverly, and Old Court. Shee seems 
to have been a good speaker and a person of pleasing address. 



Sehool-Books. 

The writers of school-books, though, not so numerous as within the 
last twenty years, showed symptoms of growing activity. A few only 
of them can be mentioned. 

Thomas Kerchever Arnold, 1800-1853, is noted as the author of an extensive and 
popular series of school-books, nearly fifty in number, chiefly manuals for teaching 
foreign languages, Latin, Greek, Frencli, and German. 

William Mayor, LL.D., 1758-1837, originally a schoolmaster, afterwards a clergy- 
man, was a most industrious producer of books, mostly school-books and compilations. 
His publications run through a period of fifty-six years, and include Spelling-Books, 
Grammars, Histories, etc. His most extensive and best-known compilations are Voy- 
ages, Travels, and Discoveries, 25 vols. ; Modern Traveller, 4 vols. ; British Tourist, 6 
vols. 

Samuel Maunder, 1790-1849, was a nseful and laborious compiler, the brother-in- 
law and co-laborer of Pinnock. Maunder's compilations, or Treasuries, are very 
numerous t Biographical Treasury; Treasury of Knowledge; Treasury of History, 
etc. 

Mrs. Markham, wrote a large number of school-histories, which have had an ex- 
tensive popularity. Historical Conversations for Young People ; History of England ; 
History of France, etc. 

Mrs Jane Marcet is celebrated for her numerous elementary text-books, under 
the form of Conversations. Probably no English school-books have been more gener- 
ally popular. Her Conversations on Chemistry was first published in 1810. It has 
been followed by Conversations on Natural Philosophy, on Political Economy, on 
Botany, on Intellectual Philosophy, on Mineralogy, on Vegetable Physiology, on Land 
and Water, on Language, on Grammar, on History of England, etc. She has also 
written a lai-ge number of still more juvenile books : Mother's First Book, Stories for 
Children, Game of Grammar, Willy's Stories for Children, etc. 

Benjamin H. Smart, for a long time teacher of Grammar and Elocution in London, 
Avrote numerous works in exposition and defence of his methods : Thought and Lan- 
guage; Introduction to Grammar on its True Basis; Accidence of Grammar; Princi- 
ples of Grammar, Manual of Rhetoric and Logic; Practice of Elocution, with an 
Outline Course of Literature; Theory of Elocution ; Practical Logic; Beginnings of a 
New School of Metaphysics, etc. 



Journalists. 

No inconsiderable part of the literature of this period was produced 
by those whose main business was that of journalism. The writers of 



508 WORDSWORTH HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

this class are especially prolific in works that come under the head of 
Miscellaneous. Among those writers, the following may be named : 

Laman Blanchard, 1803-1845, an English journalist, was associated for a time with 
Bulwer in editing the New Monthly Magazine. Blanchard was a brilliant writer, and 
he contributed numerous articles, prose and verse, to all the leading English period- 
icals. He committed suicide in a fit of insanity. Sir Edward Lytton Bulwer edited 
a collection of these writings, entitled Essays and Sketches, in 3 vols., with a memoir 
of the author. 

Michael I. Quin, 1796-1843, an Irishman, was at diflFerent times editor of the Dub- 
lin Review, and the Monthly Review, and a contributor to the Morning Chronicle 
and the Morning Herald. He published A Visit to Spain ; A Steam Voyage down the 
Danube; Steam Voyages on the Moselle, the Elbe, and the Lakes of Italy; Trade and 
Banking in England; The Autobiography of Don Augustin Iturbide: Memoirs of 
Ferdinand VII., King of Spain, translated from the Spanish ; Laborde's Petra, trans- 
lated from the French ; Nourmahal. an Oriental Romance. 

FuEDERiCK W. N. B. Baylet, 1807-1852, was chiefly known as editor of the Illus- 
trated London News. Other works : Four Years' Residence in the West Indies ; Tales 
of the Late Revolution ; Wake of Ecstasy, a Poem ; New Tale of a Tub, in verse; Lit- 
tle Red Riding Hood ; Blue Beard. 

George Searle Phillips, 1817 , many of whose works were published under 

the pseudonym of January Searle, has been editor or assistant editor of numerous 
papers both in England and in America, and has contributed largely to the press in 
all its forms. The best known of his separate works are : An Elucidation of the 
Bhagavat Gita ; a Sketch of Ebenezer Elliott, the " Corn-Law Rhymer; " The Gypsies 
of the Dane's Dyke. 

Charles Roger Dod, 1793-1855, was connected with the newspaper press of London 
for thirty seven years, and for twenty-three years of that time with the Times. He 
superintended the reports of Parliamentary Debates, and also wrote for that paper the 
biographies of the distinguished men who died during that time. His separate pub- 
lications are: The Parliamentary Companion ; Peerage, Baronetage, and Knightage. 

Edward Baines, 1774-1848, was long known as proprietor and editor of the Leed's 
Mercury. Mr. Baines wrote A History of the Wars of the French Revolution, A His- 
tory of the Reign of George the Third, A History of the County Palatine and Duchy 

of Lancaster. — Edward Baines, I.SQO , son of the preceding, was connected with 

his father in the management of the Leed's Mercury, and succeeded to the pro- 
prietorship. He has written a Life of his father, and A History of the Cotton Manu- 
facture; A History of the Woollen Manufacture; and A Visit to the Vaudois of Pied- 
mont. He is a Member of Parliament for Leeds, and a liberal in politics. — Thomas 

Baines, 1S02 , also a son of Edward B., was for many years editor of the Liverpool 

Times. He wrote Scenery and Events in South Africa, and History of the Commerce 
of Liverpool. 





CHAPTER XVI. 

Tennyson and His Contemporaries. 

The last period of our book begins with 1850, and con- 
tinues to the present time. After the death of Wordsworth, 
in 1850, the undisputed chief of English letters was Alfred 
Tennyson, Poet-Laureate. Tennyson began to be distin- 
guished about the time that Victoria became Queen, and his 
career as a poet is intimately associated with the reign of 
that great and good sovereign. 

The writers of this period are divided into seven sections : 
1. The Poets, beginning with Tennyson ; 2. The Novelists, 
beginning with Dickens ; 3. Writers on Literature and 
Politics, beginning with Carlyle ; 4. Writers on Philosophy 
and Science, beginning with Sir William Hamilton; 5. 
Writers on History, Biography, Antiquities, and Travel, 
beginning with Macaulay ; 6. Writers on Theology and Ke- 
ligion, beginning with John Henry Newman ; 7. Miscella- 
neous Writers, beginning with the Howitts. 

I. THE POETS. 

Tennyson. 

Alfred Tennyson, 1810 , Poet-Laureate, is one of 

the few thus honored who have really deserved the distinc- 
tion. 

Like Wordsworth, Tennyson rose by slow degrees into 

43* 509 



510 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

full and complete recognition ; and nothing is more note- 
worthy in his career than the calm deliberation and design 
with which every part of his career as an author has been 
planned. His works bear, to a less degree than those of any 
known author, the mark of chance or of haste ; they are, on 
the contrary, the legitimate fruits of the highest order of 
genius united with the most patient toil. 

Career. — Tennyson was born at Somersby, Lincolnshire. His life 
has been an uneventful one, passed for a time in study at Cambridge, 
with young Hallam, whose early death furnished the text for In Me- 
moriam ; then in studious retirement at Farringford House, Isle of 
Wight ; and, since 1869, at Petersfield in Hampshire. 

Tennyson is one of four brothers, sons of a clergyman of the Church 
of England, who have all manifested poetic ability. Indeed, his elder 
brother Charles was at first considered to be superior to Alfred. The 
two published in 1827, anonymously, a small volume entitled Poems 
by Two Brothers. Alfred Tennyson was then only seventeen. Two 
years later, in 1829, he gained at the University the Chancellor's prize 
by his poem of Timbuctoo. 

First Volume. — In 1830 Tennyson published his first independent volume, under 
the title : Poems, chiefly Lyrical. Unpretending as this little volume was, it established 
at once the fame of the new poet, for it contained, along with weaker pieces, some of 
his most graceful productions, bearing the impress of an original and finished style. 
Tennyson published a new edition, with many alterations, omissions, and additions, 
in 1832. Then, for many years, the poet seemed to be dormant. 

The Princess. — At length, in 1847, appeared The Princess. This fairy stranger 
was not wholly welcome, at least to the reviewers. The grim, doughty veterans of 
The Edinburgh and The Quarterly were puzzled by its apparent fantastic incongruity, 
and almost shut their eyes to the depth of underlying thought. Twenty years have 
elapsed since then, and The Princess is now recognized in its true character, as the 
profound and artistic handling of a great living question. 

In Meinoriant. — Whatever disappointment was occasioned to the poet's ad- 
mirers by The Princess, was more than compensated for by In Memoriam, in 1819. 
This elegy, unquestionably Tennyson's masterpiece, appeared anonymously, but every 
reader and critic recognized at once by whom and for whom it had been written. It 
also explained the author's long silence since 1832» In that beautiful allegory of In 
Memoriam beginning with the lines: 

On that last night, before I went 
From out the walls where I was bred, 
Tennyson has symbolized, in the shape of a retrospective dream, his despair at the 
death of his friend and the temptation which he felt, and overcame, to abandon every- 
thing to idle, selfish grief. The maidens symbolize the muses with whom he had been 
dwelling, and whom he thought to desert; but for this he was reproved by the spirit 



THE POETS. 511 

of his friend. This frieud, it is almost superfluous to add, was Arthur Henry Ilallam, 
the sou of the historian, and a young man of great promise. He died at Vienna in 
1833. 

Character of the Poem. — In Memoriam is the growth of years of grief and 
self-communing; it is the quintessence of sorrow, crystallized into the most poetic 
form, and generalized for all mankind. The poet has struck every chord of woe in tlie 
human heart; he has a message for every mourner, a word of sympathy for every 
Job-like doubter. There is not, in any language, a poem that has a nobler mission, 
and fulfils that mission more nobly, than In Memoriam. It is not the selfish wailing 
of a man over the loss of his friend; it is the lamentation of the poet Jeremiah over 
all human misery. 

Jflaud. — In singular contrast to In Memoriam came Tennyson's next poem — 
Maud. This very contrast, perhaps, was one of the reasons why Maud was received 
so coldly by the reviewers. They could not understand how the English Jeremiah 
should descend to write a love-song, and, blinded by prejudice, they pronounced poor 
Maud a failure. As in the case of The Princess, they again failed to see that Maud 
was not merely a beauty, but a type of the nineteenth century. 

Idylls of the King. — But all the doubts and dismal prognostications of the 
quarterlies were dispelled, in less than four years, by The Idylls of the King. T)ie 
very same journal — The Athenaeum — that had pronounced Maud "unworthy of its 
author," spoke of The Idylls as "his best and most artistic work." The success of 
The Idylls was paralleled only by that of In Memoriam. In some respects it is per- 
haps a more popular book. Still, future ages, we think, will judge Tennyson chiefly 
by In Memoriam. 

His later works, such as Enoch Arden, are rich in beautiful Tennysonian passages, 
but deficient in freshness. 

XJstimate of Him. — Tennyson's qualities as a poet maybe best ascertained, 
perhaps, by comparing him with others of this century. He has not the vigor, or 
the broad, creative imagination of Byron ; but he has all the depth of Wordsworth, 
and all the subtlety of Shelley, without the former's vagueness or the latter's eccen- 
tricity. Tennyson is essentially a lyric poet of the impassioned but reflective order; 
he is the child of the present generation in all its culture, its refinement, its tendency 
to doubt, its love of artistic form. 

Style, — Tennyson's style is the most finished since the days of Shakespeare and 
Milton. At times, indeed, it seems almost too faultless, and makes the reader wish 
for a little of Browning's ruggedness. In the choice of words, especially of predicates, 
and in the adaptation of old or almost obsolete words to new uses, Tennyson has not 
his equal in modern English literature. Whether we read The Lady of Shallot, or 
Locksley Hall, or The Vision of Art, or In Memoriam, or The Idylls of the King, 
we find everywhere the most exquisite adjustment of word to thought, the rarest 
suggestiveness of imagery, and the most perfect freedom and variety of construction. 
In style, certainly, Tennyson is the first model after Milton. 

Robert Browning. 

Robert Browning, 1812 — — , stands conspicuous among tlie poets 
of liis day, being inferior to Tennyson only. 

Career, — Mr. Browning was educated at the London University. He was married 
in 184^ to the poetess Elizabeth Barrett, since which time he has lived on the conti- 
nent, and chiefly at Florence, in Italy. 



512 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

First JPublicntions. — Mr. Browning's first publication was Paracelsus. It was 
highly comniended by the critics, but met with little popular favor. He next pro- 
duced the Tragedy of Strafford, which in the opinion of good judges ought to have 
been successful, but somehow it did not succeed, though presented by no less an actor 
than Macready. 

Want of I^opularity . — So has.it been pretty much with all of Mr. Browning's 
writings. They give unmistakable evidences of genius, but they are not popular. 
The author does not court popularity, and apparently does not value it, not present 
popularity at least, preferring to await the verdict of " those who shall come after."' 
But there is a studied obscurity in his meaning, particularly in his works of greatest 
mark, which will be quite as repellant to readers of the twentieth century as to those 
of the nineteenth. He will probably always have, as he now has, a few devoted wor- 
shippers, but he will never be the idol of the many. The critics will laud, but the 
people will not read. 

Other Works. — His principal works, in addition to those already named, are Bor- 
dello ; Pippa Passes, a Drama ; The Blot in the 'Scutcheon, a Drama; King Tictor and 
King Charles, a Tragedy ; Colombe's Birthday, a Play ; Lurria, a Tragedy ; A Soul's 
Tragedy; The Return of the Druses; Dramatic Romances and Lj-rics, containing many 
of those short pieces by which he is most generally known, as How we Brought the 
Good News from Ghent to Aix, The Pied Piper of Hamelin, etc. ; The Ring and the 
Book. The poem last named is his largest work, and the one in which all his pecu- 
liarities, good and bad, are most strongly marked. 

" Next to Tennyson, we hardly know of another English poet who can be compared 
with Browning. The grandest pieces in the volumes [This was written before the 
appearance of the Ring and the Book] are Pippa Passes, and a Blot on the Scutcheon. 
The latter, in the opinion of Charles Dickens, is the finest poem of the century. Once 
read, it must haunt the imagination forever ; for its power strikes deep into the very 
substance and core of the soul." — Wh^jple. 

Mrs. Bro"wning. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Barrett Browxixg, 1807-1861, is generally 
admitted to be the greatest of English poetesses. 

Early Career, — Mrs. Browning (Elizabeth Barrett) was the daughter of a 
wealthy merchant of London, and had the advantage of a superior education. She 
was, in particular, thoroughly versed in the Latin and Greek languages. She began 
authoi-ship very early in life, writipg both in prose and verse at the age of ten, and 
publishing a volume of poems at the age of seventeen. Her health was always deli- 
cate, so that she was unable to bear the strain of the highest intellectual achieve- 
ments. Had her physical powers been commensurate with her intellectual, it would 
not be easy to assign a limit to what she might have accomplished. She undoubtedly 
had genius of the highest order. But a great poem, or a great work of art of any 
kind, can only be produced by the expenditure of great and long-continued labor, and 
to such labor Mrs. Browning's physical frame was at uo time adequate. What she 
achieved, therefore, brilliant as much of it was, and enduring as some of it doubtless 
will be, must yet be accepted rather as an iutimation of what she might have done 
than its full realization. 

Works. — Her largest single work is Aurora Leigh, a narrative poem, which met 
with immediate and general favor. Casa Guidi Windows, written in Italy, and giving 
expression to her thoughts and feelings on Italian affairs, is thought to contain the 



THE POETS. 513 



finest efforts of her genius. Some of her other publications are : The Drama of Exile ; 
A Vision of the Poets ; The Poet's Tow ; Isabel's Child ; The Rhyme of the Duchess 
May; Tlie Romaunt of the Page; Prometheus Bound, a translation from the Greek; 
The Seraphim and Other Poems ; Lady Geraldine's Courtship ; The Cry of the Chil- 
dren. 

She -wrote also translations and paraphrases from Theocritus, Apuleius, Xonnus, 
Hesiod, Homer, Anacreon, and Euripides, and she contributed to the Athenajum a 
series of critical papers on The Greek Christian Poets. 

Her Sonnets deserve particular mention ; they are numerous, and of extraordinary 
excellence. Many a single sonnet in this collection is enough to make a reputation. 
The Sonnets from the Portuguese, so called, are thought to describe the love-making 
between her and Mr. Bi'owning. 

Her personal appearance is thus described by Mary Russell Mitford : " A slight, 
delicate figure, with a shower of dark curls falling on either side of a most expressive 
face — large tender eyes, fringed with dark lashes — and a smile like a sunbeam." 

She was happily married in 18i6 to the poet Robert Browning, and lived thereafter 
on the continent, chiefly in Italy, to the manifest improvement of her health. The 
poems of these later years are by far her best. "The poetical reputation of Mrs, 
Browning has been growing slowly, until it has reached a height which has never 
before been attained by any mndern poetess, though several others have had wide 
circles of readers." — North British Review, 1857. 

"She abounds in figures, strong and striking; sometimes strange and startling; 
sometimes grotesque and weird ; often, one may say, unallowable ; but always having 
a piercing point of meaning that gives warrant for their singularity. Swords have not 
keener edges, nor flash brighter lights, than the sudden similes drawn by this poet's 
hand. She illustrates at will from nature, art, mythologj-, history, literature, scrip- 
ture, common life. She plucks metaphors wherever they grow- ; and to those -who 
have ej-es to see, they grow everywhere. Occasionally, taking for granted a too great 
knowledge on the part of her readers, even of such as are cultured, her figures are 
covered with dust of old books, and their meaning is hidden in a vexing obscurity. 
But, on the other hand, her sentences often are as clear as ice, and have a lustre of 
prismatic fires." — Theodore Tilton. 

Mrs. Norton. 

;Mrs. Caholixe Elizabeth Sahah Xortox, 1808 , is a poetess 

of no little celebrity. 

Mrs. Norton is a grand-daughter of Richard Brinsley Sheridan. She was divorced 
from her husband, Hon. George Chappie Norton, in 1836. 

Ziiterary Career. — Mrs. Norton began her career as a writer very early in life. 
At the age of twelve she wrote a satire. The Dandies' Rout, and, at seventeen. The 
Sorrows of Rosalie. Her first work of merit, however, is The Undying One, a poem 
published in 1S30. Since that time she has given to the world a number of tales and 
poems. The Toice from the Factories and The Child of the Islands, like Mrs. 
Browning's Cry of the Children, are vigorous protests against the degraded condition 
of the English poor. The Dream is a vigorous poem, and Aunt Carry's Ballads a col- 
lection of verses for children. Her later works, in prose and verse, arc : Stuart of 
Dunleath, Lady of Garaye, Lost and Saved. Mrs. Norton also published a letter ad- 
dressed to the Queen, upon Lord Cranworth's Marriage and Divorce BiU, which occa- 
sioned some discussion. 

2H 



514 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

" Her ear for the modulatiun of verse is exquisite ; and many of her lyrics and 
songs carry in them the characteristic of the ancient Douglasses, being alike 'tender 
and true.' It must be owned, however, that individuality is not the most prominent 
feature of Mrs. ^Norton's poeti-y." — Moir. 

Alarie Watts. 

Alexander Alaeic Watts, 1799-1864, has been prominent as a 
poet, an editor, and a, journalist. 

Mr. Watts does not appear to have enjoyed anything higher than a good school 
education. In 1822 he published a small volume, entitled Poetical Sketches, which 
was received at once into general favor. He was afterwards connected with the Leeds 
Intelligencer and the Manchester Courier. From 1824 to 1834 he edited The Literary 
Souvenir, an elegant annual, which, by its superb engravings, contributed largely to 
the culture of art in England. In 1833 he founded The United Service Gazette, an 
organ for the army and navy, from which he retired in 1843, in consequence of a pro- 
tracted lawsuit with his partner. In 1851 he published a second volume of poems, en- 
titled Lyrics of the Heart ; some of them, written much earlier, handsomely illus- 
trated. From 1841 to 1847 he was connected with the London Standard. Some of 
the poems in the Lyrics of the Heart are by Watts's wife. 

"In his Poetical Sketches, an early work, as well as in his more recent Lyrics of the 
Heart, Alarie Watts has given abundant proofs, if not of high creative strength, of 
gentle pathos, of cultivated intellect, and an ej^e and ear sensitively alive to all the 
genial impulses of nature, of home-bred delights and heart-felt happiness." — D. 
M. Moir. 

Procter — ^^ Barry Corn^^^all." 

Bryais" WALI.ER Procter, 1790-1868, better known as "Barry 
Cornwall," was a poet of great merit. 

Mr. Procter studied at Hari-ow, being contemporary there with Lord Byron and Sir 
Robert Peel. He was a lawyer by profession, and held for many years a lucrative ap- 
pointment in the Court of Chancery : he had besides ample means by inheritance. 

Mr. Procter forms a connecting link between the present generation and one that 
has already become historical. So late even as 1866, he came before the public with 
a new work of considerable size, yet he was famous fifty years ago; — the contempo- 
rary and associate of Byron and Moore. 

Mr. Procter's first publication, Dramatic Scenes, appeared in 1821. It was an attempt 
to reproduce some of the best features of-the older English drama, and was remarkably 
successful. "None but a mind both of exquisite tact and original power could have 
created so many fine things in the very spirit of the old drama and of nature. He looks 
on the feelings of our daily human life through the soft light of imagination, rendering 
them dearer, tenderer, and lovelier to his human heart." — Blackwood. 

Mr. Procter's other publications were : A Sicilian Story and Other Poems : Mar- 
cian Colonna, an Italian Tale, with three Dramatic Sketches, and Other Poems; 
Mirandola, a Tragedy, performed at Covent Garden with great success ; The Flood of 
Thessaly; The Girl of Provence and Other Poems: Portraits of the British Poets, 
illustrated by Notes, Biographical, Critical, and Poetical; English Songs and other 
small Poems ; Essays and Tales in Prose ; Life of Edmund Keane, 2 vols., 8vo ; Charles 
Lamb, a Memoir. 



THE POETS. 515 

"If it be the peculiar province of Poetry to give delight, this author should rank 
very high among our poets, and in spite of his neglect of the terrible passion, he does 
rank very high in our estimation. He has a beautiful diction, and a fine ear for the 
music of verse, and great tenderness and delicacy of feeling. He seems, moreover, to 
be altogether free from any tincture of bitterness, rancor, or jealousy, and never 
shocks us with atrocity, or stiffens us with horror, or confounds us with the dreadful 
sublimities of demoniacal energy. His soul, on the contrary, seems filled to over- 
flow with images of love, and beauty, and gentle sorrow, and tender pity, and mild 
and holy resignation. The character of his poetry is to soothe and melt and delight, 
to make us kind and thoughtful and imaginative, to purge away the dross of our 
earthly passions by the refining fires of a pure imagination, and to lap us up from 
the eating cares of life in visions so soft and bright as to sink like morning dreams 
on our senses, and at the same time so distinct and truly fashioned upon the eternal 
pattern of nature, as to hokl their place before our eyes long after they have again 
been opened on the dimmer scenes of the world." — Jeffrey, in the Edinburgh Review. 



Adelaide Procter. 

Adelaide Anne Procter, 1825-1864, daughter of the poet Proc- 
ter, is herself a poet by divine right. 

She is the "golden-tressed Adelaide" celebrated in one of her father's songs, and 
is thus mentioned by Willis, on the occasion of his visit to the family mansion: "A 
beautiful girl of eight or nine years, ' the golden-tressed Adelaide,' delicate, gentle, 
and pensive, as if she was born on the lip of Castaly, and knew she was a poet's 
child, completed the picture of happiness." 

Miss Procter's first considerable publication was in 1858, a volume entitled Legends 
and Lyrics, a Book of Verses. It met with immediate success, and passed through a 
large number of editions. A second series of Legends and Lyrics appeared in 1860, 
and in 1862 A Chaplet of Verses. 

" Seldom do -we meet a collection of fugitive poems so pleasantly fulfilling friendly 
desire, and so able to bear the brunt of criticism as this. There is reality in it. It 
is full of a thoughtful seriousness, a grave tenderness, a fancy temperate but not 
frigid, which will recommend themselves to every one who has a touch of the artist 
in his composition. The manner (and this is much to say) is not borrowed. "With- 
out any startling originality, it is Miss Procter's own, and not her father's ; not 
Wordsworth's ; not the Laureate's ; not referable to the Brownings." — Lon. Athen. 



Charles Swain, 1803 , is often called " The Manchester 

Poet." 

Mr. Swain was a native of Manchester, and was intended for the dyeing business. 
He left the business at the age of twenty-nine, to become an engraver, to which pro- 
fession he adhered. 

Ever since his twentieth year, Mr. Swain has contributed numerous poetical pieces 
to the periodicals. Some have been published in book-form. Among the best known 
are his Metrical Essays, Beauties of the Mind, Rhymes for Childhood. Dryburgh 
Abbey is a much admired elegy on Scott. Among Swain's admirers are such names 
as Montgomery, Wordsworth, and Southey. 



Philip James Bailey, 1816 , published at the age of twenty 

a poem called Festus, which created a great sensation, 

" It is an extraordinary production, out-Heroding Kant in some of its philosophj', 
and out-Goething Goethe in the introduction of the three persons of the Trinity as 
interlocutors in its wild plot. Most objectionable as it is on this account, it yet con- 
tains so many exquisite passages of genuine poetry, that admiration of the author's 
genius overpowers the feeling of mortification at its being misapplied, and its med- 
dling with such dangerous topics." — London Literary Gazette. 

The poem was subsequently both pruned and enlarged. "Every line has under- 
gone the refining crucible of the author's brain, and has been modified by the greater 
maturity of his mind." Besides Festns, Mr. Bailey has published The Angel World; 
The Mystic; The Age, a Colloquial Satire. 

Ml'. Bailey was born at Nottingham, and studied for two sessions in the University 
of Glasgow. He afterwards studied law, and was admitted to the bar, but found a 
literary life more congenial. 

Tom Taylor, 1817 , is a popular English writer and drama- 
tist. 

Mr. Taylor studied at the University of Glasgow and at Cambridge, and was for a 
time Fellow at Cambridge and Professor of English Literature in University College, 
London. He was also admitted to the bar, but seems to have devoted himself, of late, 
exclusively to authorship. 

Mr. Taylor has contributed a number of articles to the London Punch, and to other 
periodicals. He has edited the works of Leslie, with a prefatory Essay, furnished the 
text for Birket Foster's Pictures of English Landscape, and translated the Ballads 
and Songs of Brittany. Mr. Taylor is probably best known, however, by his dramas, 
lie is the author of several of the most popular plays of the recent stage, such as 
Still Waters Run Deep, The Overland Route, Our American Cousin. The Babes in the 
Wood, etc. He has also been associated with Charles Reade in the composition of 
Masks and Faces, Two Loves and a Life, and The King's Rival. 

Talfourd. 

Sir Thomas Noon Talfourd, 1795-1854, commonly called Ser- 
geant Talfourd, was a prominent lawyer, essayist, and .dramatist. 

Talfourd studied the classics under Dr. Talpy, and lawin theoflBce of the celebrated 
Chitty. He rose to eminence in his profession, was appointed Justice of the Com- 
mon Pleas, and knighted. He was also a Member of Parliament, and assisted in 
the passage of the Copyright Act. 

Talfourd was one of the first to recognize Wordsworth's poetic merit, which he 
proclaimed in an essay entitled An Attempt to Estimate the Poetical Talent of the 
Present Age, 1815. Talfourd is also the author of the Memorials of Charles Lamb, 
18i8, and of numerous essays published in the London Magazine, Retrospective He- 
view, Edinburgh Review, and other periodicals. His best known dramas are Ion, The 
Athenian Captive, and The Castilian. Felton pronounced Ion to be "the most suc- 
cessful reproduction of the antique spirit," — an opinion which can scarcely be sus- 
tained. His miscellaneous essays were collected and piiblished in 1842, 

Talfourd was a man of literary culture and poetic sympathies, but did not possess 
an imagination sufficiently creative to become a poet. He was an eminently success- 



THE POETS. 517 

fill practitioner, and a generous, warm-hearted ruan, ever ready to lielp needy artists 
and men of letters. Henry Crabb Robinson's Diary contains many pleasing remiuLs- 
ceuces of him. 

Aytoun. 

William Edmondstoxe Aytoun, 1813-1865, son-in-law of Pro- 
fessor Wilson (Cliristopher North), and Professor of Literature and 
Belles-Lettres in the University of Edinburgh, was for many years 
also a contributor and hnally editor of Blackwood's Magazine. 

Prof. Aytoun's publicatiuus are numerous. The follo\Ying are the principal: Lays 
of the Scottish Cavaliers; Firmilian, a Spasmodic Tragedy; Poland and Other 
Poems; Bothwell, a Poem ; Ballads of Scotland; Xorman Sinclair ; Life and Times of 
Puchard 1. 

Prof. Aytoun's ballads are highly commended by all the critics. "They possess 
fluency, vigor, and movement, with an elevation of mind which is historical, if not 
poetical ; they have the polish and the skill in the use of figures which might be ex- 
pected from the professor of rhetoric and belles-lettres ; they are animated by the 
sentiment of Jacobinism which is arising among a certain class of well-minded sub- 
jects of Queen Yictoria; and they not only display the common knowledge of history, 
but show, in the prose introductions, that Mr. Aytoun has investigated and thought 
for himself." — London Spectator. 

"The Spasmodic Tragedy is designed to criticize some modern manifestations of a 
most false and extravagant taste in poetry ; and although the parody is somewliat 
long and elaborate, there runs throughout such a happy vein of humor, and the har- 
mony of the verse is so full and flowery, that the reader's interest is never allowed to 
flag.'' — Westminster' Mevieic. 

The " Lays " is by far his most popular work. Seventeen editions of it had been 
issued in 1865. 

Richard Monckton Milxes, 1809 , is favorably known as a 

poet. 

Mr. Milnes was raised to the peerage in 1863, as Baron Houghton. He is a promi- 
nent English politician, a liberal conservative, but rather noted for his independence. 
Mr. Milnes has contributed several articles to the reviews, chiefly the Westminster, 
and published several volumes of poetry, and sketches. His principal works are: 
Poems of Many Years, Poems for the People, Palm Leaves, (a sketch of travel in the 
East,) Life, Letters, etc., of Keats, etc. "The poetry of Richai'd Monckton Milnes 
possesses very con.';iderable elegance and taste, a philosophic sentiment, and a graceful 
tenderness, but is deficient in individuality and power." — Moir. 

Edward Moxox, 1858, is chiefly known ns a publisher of choice editions of the 

poets. He wrote and published, however, two volumes of his own productions, 
Christmas, and a book of Sonnets. The latter was severely criticized in the London 
Quarterly Review. 

Eliza Cook, 1817 , is the daughter of a London tradesman, and 

is very favorably known as a poet, 
44 



518 tein^nyson and his contemporaries. 

She began while still young to contribute to the higher class of London period'culg. 
In 1840, a volume of her poems was published, and met with favor. It hjis been fie- 
quently reprinted with additions. Some of the pieces which are general faToriteg 
are: The Old Arm-Chair, The Old Farm-Gate, The Last Good-Bye, Home in the Hearr, 
etc. In 18-i9, she began Eliza Cooks Journal, which attained a wide popularity, and 
was continued until lSo4. In liiGi she received a literary pension of £.UU a year. 

Charles Shirley Brooks, 1815 , is a dramatist and novc4ist 

of some note. 

"Works : Plays, Honor and Riches, The Creole, Our New Governess, The Lowther 
Arcade; Aspen Court, a Novel; Miss Violet and Her Offers; Letters of Travel in Rus- 
sia, Asia Minor, and Egypt, published originally in the Morning Chronicle and after- 
wards in Longman's Travellers' Library. Mr. Brooks wa,s originally intended for the 
law, and went through the usual studies, but found a literary life more congeniaL 

Coventry Patmore, 1823 , is one of the favorite poets of the 

present day. 

Among Mr. Patniore's minor poems are : The River, The Woodman's Daughter, Tam- 
ert(m Church Tow er. Faithful Forever. His chief work, however, is The Angel in the 
House, pronounced by Ruskin " amost finished piece of writing, and the sweetest analy- 
sis we possess of quiet, modern, domestic feeling." Complaint has been made of Mr. 
Patmore's poetry that it is occasionally careless and perverse in its style. For a number 
of years past, Mr. Patmore has been Assistant in the Library of the British Museum. 
He is also a steady contriljutor to the reviews. 

John Struthers, 1776-1853, a poet of con.siderable note and merit, 
was born in Lanarkshire, Scotland. 

Mr. Struthers was the son of a shoemaker, and began life by following his fiither's 
trade. Afterwards he learned printing, and was for thirteen years a proof-reader and 
corrector of the press, and for fifteen years keeper of the Stirling Library, Glasgow. 
His publications are : The Poor Man's Sabbaih and Other Poems ; The Peasant's Death, 
a Poem ; The Winter's Day. a Poem : The Plough, a Poem ; Dychmant, a Poem ; Poems, 
Moral and Religious; A History of Scotland, 2 vols., 8vo. 

Gerald Masse y, 1828 , is among the best of the second-class 

poets of the day. 

Mr. Massey is a native of Herts, the son of very poor parents. He received in his 
youth no education, and came to London in liis fifteenth year as an errand-boy. 

After atti'acting some attention by his poetical contributions to the newspapers, he 
published, in 1854, The Ballad of Babe Christabel, and other Lyrics. This has been 
followed by two other volumes, War Waits, and Craigcrook Castle. Massey's poetrj' is 
striking for its exuberant fancy, but lacking in depth ; his versificiition is musical 
but often careless. His general style of thought is strongly Tennysonian. 

" Robert Burns taught Scotchmen that poverty and hard work are unable to stifle 
genius ; Massey has taught the same lesson to Englishmen. The future cai-eer of one 
who has drawn beauty from poverty, and strength from privation, is one on which all 



THE POETS. 519 

men must look with interest, and some, perhaps, with a little anxiety. That it will 
be a brilliant one, we have little doubt. He is yet young, and may reasonably exp(;rt 
a long life. . . . We hope that when he dies he will leave many songs behind him in 
the hearts of the people of England, — songs which wmII assist them in the work of 
the day, and help to make the night beautiful." — Alexander Smith. 

Charles Mack ay, 1814 , is the author of a large number of 

sketches and poems, and is one of the most popular song- writers of this 
century. 

Mr. Mackay is a native of Scotland. He studied in London and on the continent; 
and has been on the staff of the Moi'ning Chronicle, and editor of the Glasgow Cou- 
rier and of the Illustrated London News. Among Mr. Mackay's best known works are : 
The Salamandrine, a Poem ; Memoiis of Extraoi'dinary Popular Delusions ; Legends 
of the Isles, a poetical collection : Voices from the Crowd; Town Lyrics ; Egeria. Mr. 
Mackay has written one hundred Songs for old English melodies, and published 
twenty-five with his own melodies. One of his songs that has spread far and wide is 
The Good Time Coming. 

" In his Songs, as in all his writings, he has one great purpose at heart, from which he 
never deviates for a moment, — the promotion of human virtue and human happiness. 
Pree government, equal laws, liberal institutions, an enlightened spirit in the ruling 
powers, the diffusion among all classes of the best feelings and charities of social and 
domestic life, — these are the objects which he pursues in every line of his writings. . . 
His verse is exceedingly sweet, flowing, and melodious ; and his skill in the musical 
art has given him a command over the resoui'ces of rhythm which few English song- 
writers possess. In his happiest effusions he has combined the force of Burns with 
the elegance and polish of Moore." — ^uropean Times. 

Sheridan Knowles. 

James Sheridan Knowles, 1784-1862, a native of Ireland, was an 
actor and a playwright of celebrity. 

After a long and successful career as an actor, Mr. Knowles retired from the stage 
and entered the ministry of the Baptist Church. His principal plays are : Virginius, 
Caius Gracchus, The Beggar's Daughter, The Wife of Mantua, The Hunchback, etc. 
He is also the author of an admirable Course of Lectures on Dramatic Poetry. The 
chief objection raised against Mr. Knowles's plays is that they are deficient in unity 
of plot. On the other hand, the characters are life-like and vigorous, the scenes are 
well grouped, and the language is impassioned. 

William Allingham, 1828 , is an Irish poet of good repute. His works are the 

following: Poems; Day and Night Songs; Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland. A pen- 
sion was granted him in 1864, on account of his poetical merits. 

Thomas Kibble Hervey, 1804 , is an editor and a poet of repute. Mr. Hervey 

studied at Oxford and Cambi-idge, and afterwards read law, but abandoned that pro- 
fession for the more congenial one of letters. He was editor of The Athena!um from 
1846 to 1854. Hervey has published several poems: Australia; The Poetical Sketch- 
Book; The English Helicon; The Devil's Progress (a political satire), etc. It has 



520 TENNYSON AND HIS CONT E M POE A RIE S . 

been the subject of general regret that one who shows such talent should have writ- 
ten so little. 

Richard Henry Horne, 1803 , is a native of London. He entered the Mexican 

navy as a midshipman ; settled in London as a man of letters ; and, iu 1852, emigrated 
to Australia. Mr. Horne has published a number of poetical and critical writings. 
The best known of his poetical pieces are Gregory VII., a Tragedy ; and Orion, an Epic 
Poem. This last was originally published at a farthing a copy, as a sarcasm upon the 
low estimation into which epic poetry had fallen at that time. 

F. W. Faber. 

Frederick W. Faber, 1815-1863, was a poet of rare excellence, 
and also a writer of most exquisite prose. 

Mr. Faber was a nephew of the distinguished theologian, George Stanley Faber. He 
was originally a clergyman of the Church of England, but became a convert to the 
Catholic religif)n, and a priest in that church. "Works: Cherwell Water-Lily and 
Other Poems; Styrian Lake and Other Poems ; Sir Lancelot, a Poem; Rosary and Other 
Poems; Jesus and Mary, a Catholic Hymn; Tracts on the Church and the Prayer- 
Rook; Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches and Foreign People; Essay on Leat- 
iflcation and Canonization; Oratory of St. Philip Neri; Catholic Home Missions; 
Spiritual Conferences ; All for Jesus; Growth in Holiness; The Blessed Sacrament; 
The Creator and the Creature; The Foot of the Cross; The Immaculate Conception ; 
Ethel's Book, or Tales of the Angels. 

HoRATius BoNAR, D. D., 1808 , is a religious poet of singular 

sweetness and beauty, many of whose sacred lyrics have already found 
their way into the hymnals of nearly every Protestant church. 

Mr. Bonar has written in prose as well as verse, all his writings being leavened 
with a strong religious feeling. Works : Hymns of Faith and Hope, 3 vols. : Bible 
Thoughts and Themes, 4 vols. ; God's Way of Peace; God's Way of Holiness; Night 
of Weeping ; Family Sermons, etc. 

"Bonar is one of the sweet singers of Israel. His genius as a poet is essentially 
lyrical. As a hymnist he resembles Watts; there is something of the same fire and 
devotion and poetical rhythm. Some of his hymns are real gems." — Lutheran Ob- 
server. 

Eev. Edward Henry Bickersteth, son of the Eev. Edward 
Bickersteth mentioned in a previous chapter, has become widely 
known as the author of an epic poem called Yesterday, To-day, and 
Forever. 

Mr. Bickersteth was educated at Cambridge, where he was distinguished for schol- 
arship and taste, and repeatedly bore off the prize for poetic merit. " He exhibits the 
broad sympathies and deeply religious spirit of his excellent father, with richer gifts 
of genius. He is just in the full vigor of manhood, of polished yet simple manners, 
frank and genial in spirit, with a face that seems to glow with active thought while 
suffused with the serenity of goodness." — Ray Palmer. Mr. Bickersteth visited the 
United States, and made a most favorable impression wherever he went. His publi- 
cations also have been received in this country Avith greatj^favor. 



THE POETS. 521 

Besides the large poem already named, Mr. Bickerstetli has published a number 
of other volumes, of various sizes, both prose and verse. One of these, The Two 
Brothers and Other Poems, was reprinted in the United States, in 1871. Twelve other 
publications ai'e enumerated in the London catalogues. 

Charlotte Elliott. 

Charlotte Elliott, 1871, is known among all Englisli- 

speaking Christians by her beautiful hymn. Just as I Am. 

Miss Elliott was a grand-daughter of Rev. John Venn. She lived during the greater 
part of her life at Torquay, but spent her last yeai-s at Brighton. She published 
Hours of Sorrow, 1836; Morning and Evening Hymns for a Week, 1842; Poems, 1863. 
She was through life an invalid and sufferer, and much of her own experience is 
breathed into her hymns. She edited The Invalid's Hymn-Book. 

Dora Greenwell, 1821 , born at Greenwell Ford, county of 

Durham, is a poetess of much merit. 

She published a volume of Poems in 1848; a second volume of Poems, entitled 
Stories that Might be True, in 1851 ; Christina, a Poem, in 1860 ; a volume of essays 
on religious and social subjects ; two pi-ose works. The Patience of Hope, and Two 
Priends, etc. I.'er poetry has been received with much favor in the United States, as 
well as in England. 

Christina G. Rossetti, 1830 , resides in London. She is the author of Goblin 

Market and Other Poems, and The Prince's Progress and Other Poems, both volumes 
being comprised in the volume of her poems published in this country. She has also 
written a volume of prose stories for children, called Commonplace and Other Stories, 
and a book of nursery rhymes for children, called Sing-Song. 

Jean Ingelo^v. 

Jean Ingelow, 1830 , is favorably known as a poet and as a 

writer of tales and sketches. 

Miss Ingelow was born in Boston, Lincolnshire, England, but has resided most of 
her life in London. Her first volume of poems was published in 1863, and at once 
gave her rank as one of the greatest living female poets. Her second volume of 
poems was published in 1867, and her last in 1870. She has written five volumes of 
prose stories for children, which have had a large sale. Within the few years in which 
she has become known to the literary world, her various works have had a sale of 
100,000 volumes. One of her poems. High Tide on the Coast of Lancashire, has been 
a great favorite with American readers. 

Svv^inburne. 

Algernon Charles Swinburne, 1843 , is a young English 

poet, who has very recently risen to distinction. 

Swinburne was born at Holmwood, near llenley-on-Thames. Ills early education 
was begun in France, and completed at Eton. He then entered the University of Ox- 

44* 



522 TEXNYSON AND HIS CO XT E M PO R A R IE S . 

ford, but did not take his degree. Ills earliest poems, contained in the notorious vol- 
ume Laus Veneris, were not published until 1866, when the poet's fame bad been 
already gained by his Atalanta and Chastelard. The outrageously gross and panthe- 
istic character of the Laus Veneris injured Mr. Swinburne seriously in the public es- 
timation. His Atalanta in Calydon, written in imitation of the Greek tragedy, was a 
marked success, and heralded the advent of a new poet. It was speedily followed 1 y 
Chastelard, and The Song of Italy, which helped to swell the report. 

It is impossible, as yet, to pronounce any final opinion upon Mr. Swinburne's genius. 
His works abound in passages of rare beauty, but the general efl'ect is unsatisfactory. 

E. R. Bul'wer-Lytton — '^ Owen Meredith." 

Edward Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 1831 , under liis assumed 

name of Owen Meredith, has achieved merited distinction as a poet. 

Mr. Lytton is the only son of Lord Lytton. He was educated at Harrow, and stu- 
died also at Bonn. He has been engaged chiefly in diplomatic service, first in Wash- 
ington, 1849-1852, as private secretary to his uncle, Sir H. L. Bulwer, then succes- 
sively at Florence, Paris, The Hague, Vienna. Copenhagen, Athens, and Lisbon. Ilis 
first publication, Clytemnestra and Other Minor Poems, appeared in 1855, and was well 
received. Since that time he has published The Wanderer, a Collection of Poems in 
Many Lands ; Lucille, a Novel in verse : Serbski Pesmi, a Collection of the National 
Songs of Servia ; and The King of Amadis. 

Morris. 

William Morris, 1830 , without any preliminary heralding, 

rose at once to fame by the publication, in 1867, of a long narrative 
poem called The Life and Death of Jason, and, in the years 1868- 
1871, of a still longer poem, called The Earthly Paradise. 

The traveller through Ludgate Hill, London, who reads, as he passes, the sign Mor- 
ris & Co , would hardly suspect that the active senior of the mechanical business there 
pursued was the author of a world-renowned series of poems. As in the case, how- 
ever, of Grote, the English banker and historian, and of our American bookseller and 
naturalist, Isaac Lea, Mr. Morris has found, or made, the leisure, in the midst of the 
cares of trade, to produce a work which bids fair to have a permanent place among 
the great English classics. 

Mr. Morris was born in London, and educated at Oxford. His first publication was 
The Defence of Guenevre and Other Poems, in 1853. It was not until the publication 
of Jason, however, in 1867, that he attracted any attention. This was followed by the 
publication, at intervals, in 18G8-1S71, of The Earthly Paradise, in four parts. 

These poems are unlike anj^ others in our literature, though more suggestive of 
the poetry of Chaucer than of anything else, and they place the author unquestion- 
ably in the rank of great poets. 

The Eartlily Paradise consists of legends derived from the classical and mediseval 
periods, set in a framework belonging to the age of Chaucer. " Certain gentlemen 
and mariners of Norway, having considered all that they had heard of the Earthly 
Paradise, set sail to find it, and after many troubles, and the lapse of many years, 
came, old men, to some western land of which they had never before heard." Miss- 
ing the "Happy Isles," the fair Avallon, which poets had fabled, the worn and disa)i- 
pointed Wanderers find some comfort in the hospitality extended to them by the Elders 



THE NOVELISTS. o23 

of this western city. Twice each month, at a solemn feast made for their entertain- 
ment, some chronicle of the olden time is rehearsed, alternately by one of the city 
Elders and hy one of the Wanderers. The chronicles rehearsed by the city Elders are 
classical, being legends from the Greek mythology ; tliose rehearsed by tlie Wan- 
derers are taken from other traditions, chiefly mediaeval. The twelve months of tlie 
year thus give occasion for twenty-four of these chronicles, each chronicle being by 
itself a long narrative poem. Between the several pairs of chronicles are pleasant 
interludes of song, keeping up the connection of the whole with the original ad- 
venture. The whole poem makes a large work about the size of the Canterbury Tales. 

Egbert Buchanan, 1841 , also of very recent celebrity, is 

sometimes called the Poet of the People. 

Mr. Buchanan's first work, Undertones, appeared in 1860. Since that time he has 
published Idyls and Legends of Inverburn ; London Poems ; Wayside Posies ; Danish 
Ballads. Mr. Buchanan was educated at the Edinburgh LEigh-School. 



II. THE NOVELISTS. 

Dickens. 

Charles Dickens, 1812-1870, was, on the whole, the great- 
est novelist of his day, and one of the greatest of all time. 

His Career. — Dickens was designed for the profession of the law, 
and began studying for that purpose, but not finding the business con- 
genial, he became a reporter of the parliamentary debates for some 
of the London papers. While engaged in this work for the Morning 
Chronicle, he wrote for the evening edition of that paper Sketches of 
Life and Character by Boz. These Sketches immediately arrested atten- 
tion. One of the booksellers thereupon engaged Dickens to write, and 
a comic draughtsman to illustrate, the adventures of a party of cock- 
ney sportsmen. This was the origin of the famous Pickwick Papers 
by Boz, with Illustrations by Phiz. The book was instantly and uni- 
versally popular. All England and America were in a roar over 
Pickwick, and Sam Weller, and the other notabilities of that wonder- 
ful book. From that date onward the author was in constant demand, 
the greedy public, like his own Oliver, ever " asking for more ; " and 
he continued, up to the verj' day of his death, to pour forth book after 
book with unceasing and most prolific activity. 

Visit to the Tlnited States.— In 1841 Mr. Dickens visited the United States, 
where he was lionized extensively, and on his return to England, he published in 
the following year American Notes for General Circulation. Some of his laughable 
caricatures of American manners and society gave great umbrage, the Americans 
then being more thin-skinned in sucli matters than they have since become, and fur- 
getting that the humorist was doing for us exactly what we admired so mucli and 



524 te:^xyson and his contemporaries. 

enjoyed so heartily in his dealings with his own countrymen. In his next succeed- 
ing novel, Martin Chuzzlevvit, in which the hero has experience of American life, the 
same features appeared, and we Amoricuns became syrioualy and most absurdly 
angry. But this feeling gradually passed away, and when, near the close of his life, 
he again visited our country, for the purpose of giving a course of public readings, he 
was everywhere received with the most hearty welcome. 

Literary Projects.— In 1845 he established The Daily News, which has since 
become a leading journal of the metropolis. His connection with it, however, was 
of short duration. In 1850 he started a weekly paper, Household A\"ords, which he 
conducted for several years, and which had a very large circulation. In 185'J he Ix-gan 
another periodical of similar character, called All the Year Round. Most of his 
novels and tales appeared first as serials in the periodicals with which he was con- 
nected. For many years before his death he published anniially a Christmas Story. 
These Christmas Stories became a notable featiire in his authorship, and are among 
his very happiest efforts. 

The following are Dickens's principal works: Pickwick Papers; Oliver Twist; 
Nicholas Nickleby; Master Humphrey's Clock; Barnaby Rudge ; Martin Chuzzle- 
wit; Dombey and Son; David Co])perfield ; Bleak House; Hard Times; Little Dor- 
rit; A 'J'ale of Two Cities ; Great Expectations; Our Mutual Friend; The Commercial 
Traveller ; Sketches by Boz. 

Ptiblic Headings. — Mr. Dickens was an excellent reader, and he had all the 
talents and qualities needed to become a first-rate actor. Towards the close of his 
life he gave public Readings of portions of his own works, with great applause; 
and his second visit to America, which was in 1867, was for this purpose. It was 
strictly a professional tour, and was eminently successful. He gave a great pleasure 
to many hundreds of thousands of his admirers, and added by the tour both to his 
fame and his fortune. 

Dickens died suddenly in the midst of his literary labors, and in the full maturity 
of his powers. His constitution, both mental and physical, was extremely active and 
vigorous, capable, apparently, of any amount of work that his royal will saw fit to 
impose ; and, in the consciousness of this abounding strength, he drew too freely upon 
his vital force. He even went further, and stimulated his flagging energies by an 
over-generous diet and by the free use of strong drinks, to enable him to bear the 
enormous strain put upon his powers, until at length nature gave way, and he died in 
the very height and flood-tide of abounding life. 

Thackeray. 

William Makepeace Thackeray, 1811-1863, shares with 
Dickens and Bulwer in the supremacy of the world of 
fiction. 

Career. — Thackeray was born in India, but educated at the Charter- 
House School, London, and at Cambridge. Life in the old Charter- 
House is depicted fully in The Newcomes, and University Life in 
Pendennis. Thackeray inherited a handsome fortune, which he lost 
and wasted. For some time he studied art in England and on the con- 
tinent, but finally decided upon literature as a vocation. 

Thackeray became a regular contributor to Fraser, Punch, The Times, The New 



THE NOVELISTS. 525 

Monthly Magazine, and other periodicals. Many of his most brilliant sketches ap- 
peared in this fugitive form, and have since been collected and republished. Among 
them are The Book of Snobs, Fitzboodle's Confessions, and Mr. Michael Angelo Tit- 
marsh's numerous sketches and essays. Nearly all these contributions, as indeed many 
of his subsequent novels, were humorously illustrated by the author himself. Thack- 
eray's first great work, Tanity Fair, appeared as a serial in 1847-8, and was speedily 
followed by Pendennis. The next in order was Harry Esmond, published in 18o2. 
To this was added, in 1855, The Xewcomes, and in 1859 The Virginians. Lovel the 
Adventurer and the Adventures of Philip appeared in 18G0 and in 1862, respectively. 

At his death Thackeray left an unfinished novel, Dennis Duval. He had also con- 
templated writing a history of the reign of Queen Anue. ]5esides Thackeray's works 
of fiction should be mentioned his Lectures on the English Humorists of the Eigh- 
teenth Century, and on The Four Georges. 

His Character and Standing. — Thackeray is familiar to all, through his own 
writings and through the numerous biographical sketches that have appeared since 
his death. His personal appearance was commanding, his manners were most genial. 
No other form was so well known to the habitues of his club and to the men about 
town. The news of his death cast a gloom over the literary world which was only 
equalled, scarcely surpassed, by the mourning for Dickens. Nor will it be necessary 
to dwell at much greater length upon his standing as a writer. The author of Vanity 
Fair and Harry Esmond will be his own best interpreter. At the same time Thackeray 
has been sorelj' misunderstood and even misrepresented. 

Tliackeratf and Dickens. — It has long been the favorite occupation of a cer- 
tain class of readers and writers to draw a comparison between him and Dickens, and 
always in favor of the latter. Dickens, in their view, is the man Avho sympathizes 
with tiie poor and lowly ; Thackeray, the cynic painter of the follies of the rich. As 
a matter of fact, however, it may be conjectured that Thackeray was personally the 
more amiable of the two ; and, as a matter of opinion, we have no reason for sup- 
posing that the writings of the one have had a healtliier eflfect than those of the other. 
Each describes what he is most familiar with, each hates and lashes hypocrisy, sham, 
and affectation, and each loves the weakly erring. If Vanity Fair be the product of 
a cynic, the same must be said, with even greater truth, of the Pickwick Papers, 
which, with all their fun and mad cap humor, are little more than a travesty of Eng- 
lish society without one solitary redeeming thought or character. 

BotJi Jleali Stic— The f;ict is, that Thackeray, as well as Dickens, is intensely 
realistic. He describes men and women as he finds them in the world in which he 
lives. In his method, however, he differs widely from Dickens, and shows his own 
immense superiority. He does not content himself with drawing portraits or carica- 
tures; he takes a strongly marked character, divests it of everything merely acci- 
dental, makes it general, and thus creates a type of character. Thus Major Pendennis 
and young Pen himself are not merely individuals : they are types of their whole 
class. The same may be said of Becky Sharp, Ethel Newcome, Beatrix Esmond. By 
the side of them, the Pecksniffs, Gradgrinds, Squoorses, fade away into mere names — 
labels for bundles of Initeful qualities. 

Ii is difficult to pronounce upon the comparative merits of Thackeray's works. Per- 
haps Harry Esmond is the most artistic. Vanity Fair the cleverest, and The Xewcomes 
the most satisfactory. Notlrng in them, however, surpasses, as a creation, the fault- 
less figure of Major Pendennis. NO one, not even Sliakespeare, could have exhausted 
more completely the characteristics of bachelor-uncltnlora. 

In style, Thackeray is most hai)py. His pages tingle with satire, or radiate with 



526 TEXXYSOi^ AND HIS COXT E MPOR ARIES . 

broad humor. Tliere is no vagueness, no weakness, in the strokes with wliicli lie por- 
trays or narrates. Everything suggests healthy life, thought, and emotioa. Even 
his minor works display the same unerring hand. For those of his readers who 
are taniiliar with French and German, tlie strange pseudcnyms which he coins for liis 
foreign characters have something inexpressibly humorous. His Lectures, also, are full 
of healthy humor and sound analysis. In short, as a man and a writer, Thackeray 
has left, by his death, a void in English letters which will not soon, perhaps never, be 
filled, and a fame second only to that of Scott. 

Miss Anxe Elizabeth Thackeray, daughter of W. M. Thackeray, has gained consid- 
erable applause as a writer of tales and sketches. The following is a list of her works : 
The Story of Elizabeth ; The Tillage on the Cliff ; Five Old Friends ; Esther and Other 
Sketches. 

Bulwer-Lytton. 

Sir Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, 1805 , stands 

clearly in the first class of English novelists. Bulwer, 
Thackeray, and Dickens form a trio of great names, so 
nearly equal that it is not easy to determine which should 
bear the palna. Each has his advocates ; each has, in fact, 
a greatness of his own, differing in kind, rather than in de- 
gree, from that of the others. 

Career. — Bnhver obtained, in 1844, the royal license to change his 
name from Bulwer to Bulwer-Lytton, the Lytton being Ms mother's 
family name. He is a son of General Bulwer. His early education 
was superintended by his mother. He afterwards studied at Cam- 
bridge. Aside from his immense labors as an author, he has served 
twice in Parliament, and was elected in 1856 Lord Eector of the L'ni- 
versity of Glasgow. 

Lord Lytton, or Bulwer, as he is generally known to American readers, evinced 
very early in life an aptitude for letters. At the age of fifteen he published Ismail, an 
Oriental Tale, and, at twenty, carried off' the Chancellor's Prize by his poem. Sculp- 
ture He may be considered to have fairly made his debut as an author, however, in 
1S2S, by the publication of Pelham. Since that time an unremitting stream of novels 
and other works has poured from liis pen. They are so well known in England and 
America that a complete list of them is scarcely necessary in this place. 

Bulwer's principal novels are perhaps Pelham ; Devereux : Eugene Aram ; The Last 
Days of Pompeii : Eienzi : Harold, the Last of the Saxon Kings ; The Caxtons ; My 
Novel ; What Will He do with It: A Strange Story. Bulwer has also published sev- 
eral dramas, of wliich Richelieu and The Lady of Lyons are the most famous ; The Xew 
Timon and Other Poems ; and many poems and ballads translated from Schiller. In 
the field of politics Bulwer has distinguished himself as a pamphleteer by The Crisis, 
Lettei-s to John Bull, Esq., and other able writings of the kind. 

The preceding sketch is only an outline of Bulwer's varied, intense, and protracted 
labors. He is probably the most prcjlific English writer of fame in the present cen- 
turj', and, in company with Scott, Dickens, and Thackeray, the most M'idely read. 



THE NOVELISTS. 527 

Character as a Novelist. — Those of his novels which have their scene in Eng- 
land portray the society of the upper classes almost exclusively. They are full of life 
and energy, the characters are strongly marked, the plot is deeply laid, if not always 
probable, and the language flows smoothly, and, at times, even eloquently. It must 
be objected to his novels, however, that they have a feature of sameness. That is to 
say, the same fundamental characters of ex-minister, the young lord his friend, un- 
known heir, villain, etc., are repeated, in slightly varied forms, through a long series 
of works. The language, too, is often grandiloquent rather than eloquent, and the 
style is diffuse. 

Buhver cannot be said to have created any new types of character. He has por- 
trayed certain features and elements of English society, and classified the characters 
which compose that society. But he has produced no grand creations, that will be 
handed down to coming generations as models — no such men and women as Jennie 
Deans, Caleb Balderstone, Becky Sharp, Major Pendennis, Mrs. Gamp, Mr. ^licawber, 
and many others that might be selected from the works of his great contemporaries. 

Bulwer's historical novels display great reading and remarkable powers of inven- 
tion ; Harold, Kienzi, and The Last Days of Pompeii are, as art-constructions, superior 
to anything in their line except Thackeray's Esmond and Yirginians. As a dramatist 
Bulwer can best be judged by the success of his Richelieu and his Lady of Lyons, 
standing pieces in every theatrical repertoire. The characters are well drawn and the 
action is intense. Bulwer's ti'anslations have the merit of being spirited and smooth, 
but not always close, renderings of the original. 

Lady Rosixa Bllwer-Lyttox, daughter of Francis "Wheeler of Limerick, Ireland, 
and wife of Buhver the novelist, has herself published several novels: Chai'ley, or 
The Man of Honor; The Budget of the Bubble Family; Bianca Cappello, an Histori- 
cal Romance ; Memoirs of a Muscovite; The Peer's Daughters; Miriam Sedley ; Be- 
hind the Scenes ; The School for Husbands, etc. 

Rt. Hon. Sir Henry Ltttox Eakle Bulwer, 1804 , a brother of Sir Edward, 

is, like him, distinguished as an author and a diplomatist. "Works: An Autumn in 
Greece; France, Social, Literary, and Political ; The Monarchy of the Middle Classes ; 
Historical Characters, Talleyrand, Cobbett, Mackintosh, and Canning. 

Disraeli — Father and Son. 

Isaac Disrael^, 1766-1848, was of Jewish extraction, the son of a 
Venetian merchant, but was born in England, near London, and was 
educated at Leyden and Amsterdam. 

Having literary tastes, and ample means for their indulgence, Mr. Disraeli addicted 
himself through life to investigations which liave redounded greatly to the benefit of 
English letters. At first he tried liis hand at poetry, but finding the muses not pro- 
pitious, he wisely forsook them, and confined himself thereafter to prose composition. 

He wrote: Curiosities of Literature; Calamities of Authors; Quarrels of Authors; 
Amenities of Literatui-e ; Literary Miscellany; Literary and Political Character of 
James I. ; Life and Reign of Charles I., o vols., 8vo ; Manners and Genius of the Lit- 
erary Character; Dissertation on Anecdotes; The Genius of Judaism : Vaurien, a Sa- 
tirical Novel ; Flim Flams, or the Life of My Uncle, etc. 

"He is one of the most learned, intelligent, lively, and agreeable authors of our 
era: he has composed a series of works, which, while they shed abundance of light 
on the character and condition of literary men, and show us the state of genius in 
their land, have all the attractions, for general readers, of the best romances." — Al- 
lan Cunningham. 



528 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

"We fear uot to s;iy, that no man who has perused these volumes [Curiosities of 
Literature] attentively, can fail to be a great, a very great deal more knowing than 
be was when he began." — Blackwood. 

Et. Hon. Benjamin Disraeli, 1805 , son of Isaac, added to the 

literary tastes of his father a strong passion and talent for political life. 

Mr. Disraeli published his first work, Vivian Grey, in 182G, when he was only twenty- 
one years old. and from that time to the present, now almost half a century, he has 
been a man of mark, and has been continually rising. 

Ill political life, after several sharp contests and defeats, he succeeded in getting 
into Parliament. Tiiere he has signalized himself by brilliant abilities as a debater; 
he rose to be at different times Chancellor of the E.xchequer and leader of tiie House 
ot Commons, and finalljs in 18ti8, to be Prime Minister. The tory and aristocratic 
party, of which he is a member, dislike and distrust him, but cannot dispense with 
the aid of a leader of such brilliant abilities, and have yielded some of tlieir must 
cherished notions rather than break with him. " Gradually, almost imperceptibly, 
he has weaned his party from their most flagrant errors. lie has taught them to pro- 
fess, at any rate, and probably to feel, a sympathy for the great body of their country- 
men." — London Times. 

Busy as has been his political life, Mr. Disraeli has found leisure to keep himself con- 
stantly before the public as an author, and his publications have been almost as nu- 
merous as the years. His principal productions are the following: Vivian Grey; 
Voyage of Capt. Popanilla; The Young Duke; Coutarini i'ieming; Alroy, the Won- 
drous Tale ; Henrietta Temple ; Venetia ; Coningsby, or the New Generation ; Sibyl, or 
the New Nation; Ixion in Heaven ; Tancred, or the New Crusade; Lothair. Besides 
his works of fiction, he has written several poems, but not of much note, and nume- 
rous political essays. He has edited most of the works of his father, and has written 
a Political Biography of Lord George Bentinck. 

Lothair, the last of Mr. Disraeli's fictions, was written in the midst of his most en- 
grossing occupations as a political leader in Parliament, and created a prodigious sen- 
sation on account of its but thinly veiled pictures of living men and women in the 
very highest circles of English society. A vein of scandal, indeed, runs through nearly 
all his fictions, beginning with Vivian Gi ey. 

'• He has written many works of fiction, all, we believe, successful, and some of them 
among the first of their time : some verse, in which he has rather tried than exer- 
cised bis powers ; and political essays, anonymous but acknowledged, in which the 
thing to be said was evidently much less valued than the manner of saying it. The 
Adventures of Capt. Popanilla deserves to be remembered as an admirable adaptation 
of Gulliver to later circumstances ; and the Wondrous Tale of Alroy is a more imagin- 
ative attempt to naturalize in our language that rhyme and assonant prose which has 
so great a charm for Eastern ears." — Edinburgh Review. 

Trollope — Mother and Sons. 

Mrs. Frances Trollope, 1863, mother of the two distin- 
guished sons of the same name, was herself a writer of no mean abilities. 

Mrs. Trollope passed three years in America, and afterwards travelled and resided 
a number of yeai-s on the continent. In 1S31 she published two volumes on the Do- 
mestic Manners of the Americans, which gave great dissatisfaction to the nation de- 



THE NOVELISTS. 529 

scribed, and wei-e also severely handled by critics in England. The book was one of 
the many of like kind on that subject, whose appearance forty or fifty years ago was 
the regular signal for denunciation and counter-denunciation. Mrs. Trollope's work 
contained a fair share of gossipy truth, many mistakes, and not a few absurdities. It 
was succeeded by one or two other books of travel, and a formidable list of novels, 
which were in great favor at the time, but which are uow neglected for more recent 
favorites. 

" Mrs. Trollope's chief defect is coarseness and violence of contrast ; she does not 
know where to stop, and is too apt to render her characters not ridiculous only, but 
odious, in which she offends against the primary laws of comic writing. Moreover, 
she neglects light and shade in her pictures ; her personages are either mere embodi- 
ments of all that is contemptible, or cold abstractions of everything refined and ex- 
cellent. Her best work is, perhaps, 'The Widow Earnaby,' in which she has reached 
the ideal of a character of gross, full-blown, palpable, complete pretension and vulgar 
assurance. The widow, with lier coarse, handsome face, and her imperturbable, un- 
conquerable self-possession, is a truly rich comic conception." — Shaw. 

Anthony Trollope, 1815 , son of the preceding, has attained 

great eminence as a writer of novels, 

Mr. Trollope was employed for a number of years in the English Post-OfBce De- 
partment. He does not appear to have prosecuted his studies any farther than in 
the public schools of Winchester and HarroM'. His career as a novelist was begun 
comparatively late in life, in 1847, by the publication of the Macdermots of Bally- 
cloran. 

Mr. Trollope's subsequent novels are so numerous and so uniformly good that it is 
rather difficult to specialize among them. La Vendee, Barchester Towers, The Ber- 
trams, Orley Farm, may perhaps be cited as the best. Besides his novels, Mr. Trol- 
lope has published several volumes of travel, the best known of which are The West 
Indies and the Spanish Main, and North America. He has also contributed largely 
to the magazines and weekly papers of London. 

Character as a Novelist. — As a writer of prose fiction, Mr. Trollope may be 
set down as among the very foremost in the second class — reserving the first class 
for such magnates as Scott, Thackeray, Dickens, and Bulwer. lie has not created 
any really great characters, either male or female, or invented any remarkable narra- 
tives. But, on the other hand, his novels are intensely realistic portraitures of Eng» 
lish social life. The women, in particular, interest us because they are the same, 
slightly idealized, it is true, that we meet, or should be glad to meet, in our every^ 
day life, the fresh, healthy outgrowths of the cultured classes of England. 

All Mr. Trollope's works are clothed in an atmosphere of healthy and robust purity, 
alike removed from sentimentality and extravagance. These qualities, combined 
with ease of style, have procured for the author an immense popularity which shows 
no signs of diminution. The student of English manners can find no apter illustra- 
tion, perhaps, of the contrast between the present century and the past, than by 
comparing Tom Jones wath the exquisite little story of Orley Farm. 

Thomas Adolphus Trollope, 1810 , a brother of the novel- 
ist Anthony Trollope, is himself a novelist of repute and also an his- 
torian. 

Mr. Trollope, who was educated at Oxford, has been a permanent resident of Flor^. 
45 2 I 



530 TEXNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

ence for the last twenty years and more. He had travelled extensively on the conti- 
nent before that time. Many of liis novels are illustrative of Italian life and history. 
Among them are Paul the Pope and Paul the Friar, La Beata, Guilio Malatesta, 
Beijpo the Conscript, etc. Among his biographical sketches are A Decade of Italian 
Women, The Girlhood of Catharine di Medici and Filippo Strozzi. He has also pub- 
lished several volumes of sketches of travel, such as A Summer in Brittany, A Sum- 
mer in Western France, A Lenten Journey in XJmbria and the Marches of Ancona. 
On the other hand, Lindisfarm Chase, Artingale Castle, and the Garstangs of Garstang 
Grange are stories of England. 

Mr. Trollope's great work, however, is his History of the Commonwealth of Flor- 
ence to the Fall of the Republic (1531), published in 1S65. Of this it is safe to say 
that it is one of the most valuable coutributioas to special history that our literature 
possesses. The theme is splendidly fascinating, and the -historian has spared no 
trouble or time in investigating original works and documents. The work reads more 
like a romance than a sober historical narrative. The author may be reproached, 
perhaps, Avith dififuseness, and his style is occasionally undignifiedly familiar. But 
he has certainly succeeded in portraying the wonderful Italian republic in all its 
glory, its meanness, its greatness, its weakness, its party strife, its art splendor, and 
its sudden catastrophe. 

Charles Reade. 

Charles Eeade, D. C. L., 1814 , is one of the great English 

novelists of the present day. 

Mr. Eeade studied at Oxford, and was admitted to the bar, but seems to have given 
up the law entirely for letters. His first novel. Peg Woffington, appeared in 1852, and 
established his fame. It is unsurpassed, in true artistic merit, by anj' of its more am- 
bitious successors. The most important of these are Christie Johnstone, Never too 
Late to Mend, White Lies, Love Me Little Love Me Long, The Cloister and the Hearth, 
Hard Cash, GriflBth Gaunt, Foul Play (written conjointly with Boucicault), and Put 
Yourself in His Place. 

Cliaractev as a WTiter, — Mr. Reade's merits and failings have been so much 
discussed of late, — in the controversy over Griffith Gaunt, — that they need not be 
repeated here in detail. No English novelist has ever surpassed him in the ability to 
delineate human character, and lay bare the springs of human action. We may dis- 
like the personages themselves, and object to the general tendency of the works as 
prejudicial to sound morality, but we cannot reft-ain from admiring the ease and preci- 
sion of the writer's art. Charles Reade"s men and women, passionate and unscrupulous 
as they may often be, are creatures of flesh and blood, and not mere lay-figures. Par- 
ticularly is this true of the women characters. Here Reade is infinitely superior to 
Dickens, and even surpasses Thackeray, except when the latter is at his very best. In 
this respect Reade is inferior, if to any one, only to "George Eliot," and even this 
inferiority is not due so much to the manner of execution as to the quality of the 
characters portrayed. 

The dialogue in Eeade's works is easy, and the descriptions are graphic. The style 
throughout is the full and hearty expression of intense emotional life. It must be 
noted, however, that Reade, in his later works, shows strong symptoms of mannerism 
and a disposition to rely upon sensational positions and unnatural effects. Certainly 
no other of Reade's works will compare with the simplicity and the fresh exuberance 
of Peg Woflfington. GriflBth Gaunt is perhaps the most striking. It is a very artistic 
presentment of a very hateful theme. The general conception and atmosphere of the 



THE NOVELISTS. 531 

piece place it in the French school. Instead of treating the dark side of married life 
as a tremendous ethical and psychological problem, as Goethe has done in his Elec- 
tive Affinities, Reade regards it rather as a background that may serve to lighten the 
brilliant forms and trappings of the actors. 

It should also be borne in mind that several of Reade's works, especially his Never 
too Late to Mend, and his Put Yourself in His Place, belong to the class of novels 
known as tendency -pieces, i. e., works of imagination intended to effect some ulterior 
object. Generally, as in the case of these two under discussion, the ulterior object is 
some social reform, which the writer hopes to bring about by showing, by means of 
concrete, living example, the pressing want of improvement. Thus, Never too Late 
to Mend was a vigorous protest against the then existing prison-system of England, 
and Put Yourself in His Place was intended to show the evils of Trades Unions. The 
great danger, for all such tendency-pieces, is that unless they possess some general 
human interest, over and above this special theme, they will themselves pass away 
with the evil which they have helped to destroy. 

William W. Reade, , a nephew of Charles Reade, and a graduate of Ox- 
ford, has written several works : Charlotte and Myra, a Puzzle; Liberty Hall, a Story 
of Colleges ; The Veil of Isis, or the Mysteries of the Druids ; Savage Africa, a book 
of wild travel, etc, 

Mayne Reid. 

Captain Mayne Eeid, 1818 , is the author of a large number 

of works descriptive of adventure, half fact, half fiction, which are 
chiefly captivating as boys' books, 

Capt. Reid was a native of the north of Ireland, and began studying for the minis- 
try. Impelled by a love of adventure, he abandoned his theological studies, and in 
1838 migrated to the United States. Here he passed several years in travelling 
through the Indian country. After returning to civilization, he contributed largely 
to the press of New York and Philadelphia. In 1845 he enlisted as a volunteer, and 
served through the Mexican War. In 184:9, he was about to join the Hungarian revo- 
lutionists, when he learned of Gorgey's surrender. He thereupon settled in Lon- 
don, and began that series of boys' books of adventure which has since carried his 
name over both continents. 

The list of his publications up to date is very long. There are forty odd works, 
written in the same general style. The best of them are, perhaps. The Rifle Rangers, 
The Boy Hunters, The English Family Robinson, The Forest Exiles. They have been 
highly commended for the freshness and accuracy of their descriptions, and their 
general healthy tone. 

Charles Kingsley. 

Eev, Charles Kingsley, 1819 , has gained distinction in sev- 
eral walks of literature, but is chiefly known as a novelist. 

Mr. Kingsley is a native of Devonshire. He was educated at Cambridge, and is a 
clergyman of the Church of England, belonging to what is known as the "Broad 
Church Party." 

Mr. Kingsley is one of the most popular authors of the century. His first work of 
prominence was Alton Locke, a novel depicting the times of the Chartist troubles in 
England. This was followed by Yeast, in 1851 ; by IIy])atia, in 1853, the scene of 
which is laid in Alexandria during the times of the early Christian Church; West- 



532 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

■ward Ho ! or Sir Amyas Leigh, in 1855 ; Two Years Ago. 1857 ; The Heroes, or Greek 
Fairy Tales for my Children ; Uereward, the Last of the Saxons. 

Besides these, his principal works, Mr. Kingsley has published several volumes of 
Sermons and several Lectures on historical and social subjects, and, very recently, 
At Last, or Sketches of Travel in the "West Indies. His I'oems were first published 
in a collected form in 1856. Prominent among them may be mentioned the ballad of 
The Three Fishers, and The Sands of Dee. 

Discussing, as he does, the gravest problems of Church and State in a liberal, not to 
say radical, spirit, Mr. Kingsley has been subjected to severe and oftentimes unju^^t 
criticism. Blackwood's Magazine, in particular, has been very severe in its strictures. 

diameter. — Mr. Kingsley is no doubt far from being an exact historical writer. 
Now and then, in his Avorks of fiction, he is guilty of anachronism in his characteriza- 
tions, although not in his incidents. Even his professedly historical Lectures are tinged 
too much with the spirit and style of fiction. But, with all his defects, his great merits 
as-a writer and thinker are beyond question. His characters, even when not perfectly 
historical, are still perfectly human — creatures of flesh and blood and brains. His 
style is vigorous in the e.xtreme, pointed without being strained, elegant in the selec- 
tion of words, and abounding in passages of the rarest beauty. His poetical pieces 
have the merit of uniting depth and intensity of feeling with perfect simplicity of 
language, while their imagery is suggestive rather than descriptive. 

Henry Kingsley, 1830 , brother of Charles Kingsley, is a rising novelist of the 

day. His principal works, so far, are The Kecollections of GeofFry Hamlyn, Raven- 
shoe, Austin Elliot, The Hillyars and the Burtons, Leighton Court, Silcote of Silcotes. 

Thomas Hughes. 

Thomas Hughes, M. P., 1823 , better known in 

America, as in England, by his pseudonym of Tom Brown, 
is the author of several popular works. 

The -works hy which chiefly Mr. Hughes acquired celebrity are : 
Tom Brown's School-Days, describing life at Eugby under the ad- 
ministration of Arnold, and Tom Brown at Oxford, describing life at 
the University. 

Personal History. — Thomas Hughes was born at Donnington Priory, in Berk- 
shire, and educated at Eugby and Oxford. He passed through Oxford in the very 
height of that extraordinary intellectual ferment which, beginning with the Tracta- 
rians, ended in supplying English Catholicism on the one hand, and English Eadical- 
ism on the other, with their most active and efficient recruits. Thomas Hughes had 
gone to Oxford from Rugby, where his warm, loving, and earnest nature had been 
deeply and permanentlj' affected by the influence of Dr. Arnold. His College of Oriel 
was, of all the Oxford colleges, the most profoundly stirred by the Tractarian move- 
ment ; and although Mr. Hughes is not to be classed with the thinkers and theo- 
logians upon whom and through whom that movement produced its most memorable 
effects, it nevertheless modified and gave tone to his subsequent career. 

Career at College. — He was more conspicuous at college for his manliness of 
character than for his scholarship. The athletic sports which he has described so well 
in his stories of school and University life found in him a most ardent practical disci- 
ple. Perhaps his first appearance as an author was in the pages of a University pub- 
lication called "Weeds from the Isis," in which he printed a lively and picturesque 



THE NOVELISTS. 533 

poetical account of a great Universitj- boat-race. Doubtless he then little dreamed that 
twenty j^ears afterwards he would be called by American voices to preside as umpire 
over a similar contest between the crews of an English and an American University. 

Subsequent Career. — On leaving Oxford, Mr. Hughes began the study of the 
law. under the guidance of an eminent lawyer who died but recently, full of years and 
of honors, as Chief Baron Pollock of the Exchequer. He took, however, quite as 
deep an interest in the great social questions which had begun a quarter of a century 
ago to agitate England, as in his legal researches. He attached himself to the group 
of active and earnest young men who made Frederic Dennison Maurice their central 
guide and teacher ; and with the two Lushingtons, Mr. Malcolm Ludlow, Charles 
Kingsley, Llewelljm Davies, and Lord Goderich, now the Marquis of Ripon, lie soon 
became well known as a hard-working believer in the possibility of saving English 
society by elevating the lower classes of England. Fi-om the foundation of the 
"Working Men's College," in Loudon, Mr. Hughes gave himself without stint to its 
service. The elevation and manliness of his nature early won for him not only the 
confidence but the frank admiration of his associates. He sat, unconsciously enough, 
to Charles Kingsley for the character of Sir Amyas Leigh in the charming romance 
of " Westward Ho ! " In the promise of his early manhood he mai-ried Miss Fanny 
Ford of Devonshire, a niece of Richard Ford, the cynical but clever author of the 
famous " Handbook of Spain," and established himself in a delightful little homestead 
at Wimbledon, in Surrey, which he has long since exchanged for a London house in 
Park Street, Grosvenor Square. He has had little success in Parliament, though a hard 
and honest w^orker on committees. He is not facile enough and not diplomatic enough 
for a successful politician. In 1870 Mr. Hughes visited America, and had a most cor- 
dial reception. 

Sis AMthorshiii. — It was in 1857 that Mr. Hughes first became known as an 
author, or indeed widely known at all. His account of " Tom Brown's School-Days 
at Rugby," which was to a very considerable degree autobiographical, took immediate 
hold upon the public heart. Its success was a triumph of character quite as much 
as of ability. The style had the literary charms, indeed, of directness, strength, and 
simplicity ; but its supreme charm lay in its transparent veracity. Tom Brown at 
Oxford, which followed, was of the same general character, though less fresh and 
forcible. 

Lever. 

Charles J. Lever, M. D., 1809 , is one of the best and most 

popular novelists of the century. 

Mr. Lever is a native of Ireland. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and 
afterwards studied medicine on the continent. For a number of year's, he was a suc- 
cessful practitioner, but after 184:2 he devoted himself exclusivelj- to letters. Lever's 
principal works are Harry Lorrequer, Charles O'Malley, Jack Hinton, Tom Burke, 
Maurice Tiernay, and Kate O'Donoghue. 

As a delineator of the droll side of Irish life and character, and of army life in gen- 
eral, Lever is unequalled. The plot of his novels is usually weak, and the professed 
heroines are tame and conventional. But the other characters are all highlj' marked, 
and reveal a wealth of humor and fun that borders on the incredible. They are all 
excellent, and some of them, like Mickey Free and Major Monsoon, may be safely 
classed among the greatest literary creations. Lever's later works are not so good as 
his early ones, because they treat of the same general themes, and are consequently 
lacking in freshness. There is a charm, a fascination, about such books as Harry Lor- 
requer, Charles O'Malley, and Jack Hinton, that captivates the young imagination, 
45* 



634 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE MPOR A Pwl ES . 

and does not lose its power even in after-life. Of all care-dispelling, mirth-provoking 
books, Charles O'Malley is the most genial. It is one carnival of wit, hnmor, and 
revelry from end to end, with just enough of the shady side of life to temper the 
merriment, and prevent it from becoming monotonous, as is the case in " Terdant 
Green." 

It may be added, in conclusion, that Lever has long been editor of the Dublin Uni- 
versity Magazine, and has also published many contributions in Blackwood's Maga- 
zine. 

Lover. 

Samuel Lover, 1797-1868, a native of Dublin, was the author of 
a number of sketches, songs, and novels of Irish life. 

The best known of Lover's novels are Rory O'Moore, Handy Andy, and Treasure 
Trove. The Angels' Whisper, Rory O'Moore, and Molly Bawn are the most admired 
of his songs. 

For a number of years Mr. Lover delivered in Great Britain and the United States 
a course of Irish Evenings, or entertainments in which he told his own stories, and 
sang his own songs to his own music. The broad, blundering fun of Handy Andy has 
been welcomed everywhere. But Mr. Lover cannot compare with his great rival, 
Charles Lever. The latter has infinitely more play and delicacy of feeling, and a wider 
range of character, as well as keener insight. Mr. Lover's books are simply funny. 

Warren. 

Samuel Warren, M. D., 1807 , is prominent both as a nov- 
elist, and as a. writer on law. He is one of the few who have suc- 
ceeded in reconciling the lighter muse with the proverbially '* jealous 
mistress." 

Mr. Warren studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh, but soon turned aside 
to the profession of the law. He has held various legal oflSces, and he sat in Parlia- 
ment for two terms. For a number of years he was Recorder of Hull. In 1859 he was 
appointed Master in Lunacy. 

His legal treatises have all been highly recommended by the best authorities. The 
principal are: Popular and Practical Introduction to Law Studies ; Select Extracts 
from Blackstone's Commentaries ; The Moral, Social, and Professional Duties of At- 
torneys ; and Blackstone's Commentaries systematically abridged and adapted to the 
Existing State of the Law. 

But Dr. Warren is far better known as a novelist than as a writer of legal treatises. 
His earliest work. Passages from the Diary of a Late Physician, a collection of 
sketches, first appeared in Blackwood's Magazine, and attracted general attention. 
So intense was the air of reality about these sketches that one of Dr. Warren's critics 
found fault with them as a betrayal of professional confidence. His next — and also 
his best work — was Ten Thouj^and a Year, which likewise appeared in Blackw-ood as a 
serial. This novel has its faults, and grave ones; it is too long, and, being written in 
the interests of the Conservative party, betrays too palpably its tendenc3^ But with 
all its defects, it is a delightfully fascinating book, and some of its characters have 
already passed into the permanent gallery of great English creations. Tittlebat Tit- 
mouse and Oily Gammon stand on an equal footing with Oliver Twist and Uriah Heep. 
Warren's other works, Now and Then, and the allegorical poem of The Lily and the 
Bee, are decidedly inferior. 



THE NOVELISTS. 535 

G. P. R. James. 

George Payne Eainsford James, 1800-1860, was the most volu- 
minous novelist of his day. 

Mr. James was a native of London. While still very young he attracted the atten- 
tion of Washington Irving, vi^ho encouraged him in his attempts at authorsliip. In 
1822 appeared his first work, Edward the Black Prince ; in 1829, Richelieu, which 
had first received in manuscript the approving verdict of Sir Walter Scott. From 
this time on, Mr. James was the producer of an almost interminable series of histori- 
cal novels, amounting to one hundred and eighty-nine volumes. He is a pleasing 
writer, and very popular ; but his works have a monotony of plot, character, and 
description, that render them tiresome to the critical reader. Any one of them is 
almost the precise counterpart of all the others. Mr. James cannot be said to have 
added any new creation to the world of imagination. 

Wilkie Collins. 

WiELiAM WiEKiE CoLLiNS, 1824 , is a distinguished novelist, 

and the son of William Collins the landscape painter. 

The first publication of Wilkie Collins was a Life of his father, in 1848. Since that 
time he has written Rambles beyond Railways; Antonina, or the Fall of Rome; 
Basil; Mr. Wray's Cash-Box; Hide and Seek; After Dark; The Dead Secret ; Arma- 
dale ; The Moonstone ; No Name ; Queen of Hearts ; Woman in White ; Man and 
Wife, etc. 

" Mr. Wilkie Collins has justified the expectations that were formed of him on the 
appearance of his first acknowledged romance, Antonina. Since then he has gone on 
steadily improving, each work making progress on the preceding one. In his earlier 
works he delighted in the morbid anatomy and painful delineation of monstrous 
growths. of miscalled human nature. As his mind has matured and mellowed, it has 
become healthier. Mr. Collins has the faculty of invention well under control ; and 
he keeps clear of extravagance, either in style or sentiment." — London Athenseum. 

Other Novelists. 

There are, in this period, many other writers of fiction, who are 
authors of no little mark. A few of them only can be mentioned. 

William Harrison Ainsworth, 1805 , has attained some celebrity as a novelist. 

"Jack Sheppard," and other tales of the same kind, making heroes of the lowest class 
of criminals, gave the author for a time a most unenviable reputation. His later 
stories, such as The Tower of London, Old St. Paul's, Windsor Castle, and St. James's 
Palace, are in a better vein. 

Thomas Colley Grattan, 1796-1864, a popular Irish novelist, was born in Dublin. 
He spent some time on the continent, of which many traces appear in his works, and 
he was British consul at Boston, U. S., from 1839 to 185:^. The following are his prin- 
cipal publications: Highways and Byways, or Tales of the Roadside, picked up in 
the French provinces by a walking gentleman ; Traits of Travel ; Men and Cities, or 
Tales of Travel ; Legends of the Rhine; Philibert, a poetical romance; The Heiress 
of Bruges; Jacqueline of Holland ; Agnes de Mansfelt; The Master Passion ; History 
of the Netherlands ; History of Switzerland, etc. 



536 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

TTiLUAM Carletox, 1T9S-1869, was a native of Ireland and a writer of Irish tales. 
Works : Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry ; Fardorougha, the Miser ; The Fawn 
of Spring Tale ; The Clarionet ; Yaleutine McClutchy ; Willey Ileilley. "ilr Carle- 
tou lias caught most accurately the lights and shadows of Irish life. His tales 
are full of vigorous, picturesrxue description and genuine pathos." — Lon. Quar. 
Review. 

Leiich Ritchie, 1800-1866, was born at Greenock, Scotland. He began life as a 
banker"s clerk, but after sundry experiments settled down in the profession of letters 
in London. He wrote a large number of works, chiefly novels, tales, and sketches, 
and contributed to or edited a great many more. Although he did not rise to the 
level of the great novelists, his tales had decided merit, and were always in good de- 
mand. The following are some of his best known works: Head Pieces and Tail 
Pieces; London Night Entertainments; Romance of History ; Ireland, Picturesque 
and Romantic; The Game of Life, a Novel ; The Magician, a Romance: History and 
Description of Versailles ; Pedestrian Ramble along the Wye ; British World in the 
East, etc. 

Robert Folkestone Williams, , Professor of History in the Cavalry College, 

England, has written a large number of historical as well as some poetical and ficti- 
tious works. Among the latter may be named Mephistopheles in England ; Eureka, 
a Prophecy of the Future ; Maids of Honor; Strawberry Hill, an Historical Novel; 
The Luttrells; Jack Scudamore's Daughter; Rhymes and Rhapsodies. Also three 
Shakespearian novels: The Youth of Shakespeare, Shakespeare and hisFrie1ids,andThe 
Secret Passion. Of historical works the following may be named : Court and Times of 
James I., 2 vols. ; Court and Times of Charles I., 2 vols. ; Memoirs of Sophia Dorothea, 
Consort of George I., 2 vols. ; Domestic Memoirs of the Royal Family and of the Court 
of England, 3 vols., 8vo ; Lives of the Princes of Wales; Lives of the English Cardi- 
nals, 2 vols. ; Life of Bishop Atterburj-, 2 vols. 

Eliot B. G. Warbltrton, 1810-1852, was born in Ireland, and educated at Cambridge. 
He studied law and was admitted to the bar, but never practised. He had landed 
estates in Ireland, whose oversight engaged some portion of his time, and the rest was 
given to society, -books, and travel. He was lost in a steamer destroyed by fire on the 
passage to the West Indies. He published The Crescent and the Cross, or Romance 
and Realities of Eastern Travel ; Memoirs of Prince Rupert ; Reginald Hastings ; 
Darien, or The Merchant Prince. — Major George Warburtox, d. 18.57, brother of the 
preceding, was for some time a resident of Canada, and afterwards Member of Parlia- 
ment. He wrote Hochelaga, or England in the New World; The Conquest of Canada; 
A Memoir of Charles Mordaunt. 

Francis E. Smedlev, 1815-1864. wrote popular novels, comic ballads, and so forth, 
mostly under the name of Frank Farleigh. He edited also, for a time, Cruikshank's 
Magazine, and Sharpe's London Magazine. Gathered Leaves, a Collection of his Poeti- 
cal Works, with a Memoir by Edmund Yates, appeared after his death. His novels 
were : Frank Farleigh, Lewis Arundel, Fortunes of the Colville Familj', Harry Cover- 
dale's Courtship, etc. 

Jane Porter. 

Miss Jane Porter, 1776-1850, tlie daughter of a surgeon in the 
English army, was the author of many works, some of which have 
made her name famous. 

Miss Porter's chief works are : Thaddeus of Warsaw, The Scottish Chiefs, and Sir 
Edward Seaward. This last was published as an authentic account of Sir Edwards 



THE XOVELISTS. 537 

ship-R-reck and his discovery of certain islands in the Caribbean Sea. Like De Foe's Ac- 
count of the Plague, it was a complete fiction, and yet so like a veritable narrative 
as to mystify completely both readers and reviewers. 

Thaddeus of Warsaw and the Scottish Chiefs are as widely known as any books of 
their class in the language. They are read by every school-boy and school-girl in the 
sentimental period of life, and call forth a perennial oittburst of tears or enthusiasm. 
Neither work is distinguished for historical accuracy or profound insight into human 
nature. Yet the two are tmique, and will be read and enjoyed by each successive gen- 
eration of youth by reason of their sweet style and sentiment. The Scottish Chiefs 
suggested to Sir Walter Scott the idea of his Waverly Novels: Miss Porter, then, may 
claim the honor of having led the way to the great field of historical novel-writing. 
Besides these principal works, Miss Porter was associated with her sister, Anna Maria 
Porter, in several publications, and also contributed largely to the magazines. 

AxxA Makia Poktee, 17S0-1832, sister of the more celebrated Jane Porter, was the 
author of many popular stories and novels, the best of which perhaps are the Hun- 
garian Brothers, Lake of Killamey, Don Sebastian, Fast of St. Magdalen. She was 
also associated with her sister in ptiblishiug the series known as Tales Round a Winter's 
Hearth. 

Sir Robert Ker Porter, 1780-1S42, was a younger brother of Miss Jane Porter. Sir 
Robert began his studies in painting under Benjamin West, and rose to distinction, 
being appointed historical painter to the Emperor of Russia. Among his celebrated 
battle-pieces are The Storming of Seringapaiam, The Siege of Acre, The Death of Sir 
Ralph Abercromby, etc. He accompanied Sir John Moore's disastrous expedition, 
travelled extensively in the East, and was for a number of years British consul in 
South America. Besides his paintings, Sir Robert is the author of several works of 
travel in Sweden, Russia, Portugal, Spain, a sketch of the French campaign in Rus- 
sia, and travels in Georgia, etc. These volumes do not appear to possess any special 
merit of style, and the information they impart is not always new or valuable. 

Miss Pardee. 

Miss Julia Paedoe, 1S08-1S62, daughter of an English officer, 
travelled extensively, and wrote a number of sketches and tales which 
were favorably received. 

Among Miss Pardee's prominent works are Traits and Traditions of Portugal, The 
City of the Magyar, The City of the Sultan, The Romance of the Harem, all based 
upon her own personal observations in travel. She also published several novels, 
Reginald Lyle, The Jealous Wife, The Rival Beauties, and others, as well as numerous 
historical sketches. The Court of France in the Seventeenth Century, The Memoirs of 
Marie de Medici. 

Mrs. S. C. Hall, ISO-i , has a deservedly high reputation as 

a delineator of Irish character, and a writer on Irish subjects in 
general. 

The following are Mrs. Hall's principal works : Sketches of Irish Character ; Lights 
and Shadows of Irish Life ; Tales of the Irish Peasantry ; Ireland, its Scenery, Character, 
etc., a large illustrated work in which she Lad the assistance of her husband ; Pil- 
grimage to English Shrines ; Chronicles of a School-Room ; The Buccaneer, a Novel ; 
The Outlaw, a Novel ; Uncle Horace, a Novel, etc., etc. " In her Irish stories, Mrs. 



538 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE M POE A EIES . 

Hall excels. Her rustic maidens are copied from the cottage ; nothing can be more 
faithful and lively : nor are her hinds and husbandmen anything inferior. We no- 
where see the Irish character more justly, or so pleasantly, represented. She sees 
nature in her proper dimensions : there is fancy, but no exaggeration, and life always." 
— Alla7i Cunningham. 

Samuel Carter Hall, ISOO , husband of the preceding, has long been known 

as tlie editor of the London Ai-t Journal and of several illustrated works of a high 
character, The Book of Gems, The Book of British Ballads, etc. 

Julia Kavanagh, 1824 , is a native of Ireland, and the writer of a number of 

novels and tales which are widely read. The favorite ones are Madeleine, Nathalie, 
and Grace Lee. Miss Kavanagh also published, in 1850, Woman in France in the Eigh- 
teenth Century, a biographical sketch. Her writings ai'e characterized by ease of style 
and sharp delineation of character, both male and female. 

Mrs. Katherine Thomson, 1862, the wife of Anthony Todd Thomson, M. D., 

was the author of a large number of volumes, partly novels and tales, and partly his- 
torical works. Among the latter may be named her lives of Wolsey, Sir Walter Ra- 
leigh, the Duchess of Marlborough, Viscountess Snndon, The Duke of Buckingham, 
The Court of Henry the Eighth, Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. Among her 
novels, each in 3 vols., are Constance, Rosabel, Lady Anabella, Anne Boleyn, Widows 
and Widowers, Rayland Castle, White Monk, Chevalier, Lady of Milan, Court Secrets, 
Faults on Both Sides, etc. 

The Baroness Tautphoeus, , originally Miss Montgomery, a native of Wales, 

England, and married to the Chamberlain of the King of Bavaria, has written several 
novels of a high order of merit : The Initials, At Odds, Quits, and Cyrilla. 

Elizabeth S. Sheppard, 1830-1862, a native of Blackheath, England, and a daughter 
of an English clergyman, had a special passion for music, and wrote several art-novels 
of a highly imaginative character, intended to illustrate her favorite theme : Charles 
Auchester, the principal character in it, being intended for Mendelssohn ; Counterparts, 
or the Cross of Love ; My First Season ; The Double Coronet ; Rumor. 

Catherine Sinclair. 

Catherine SiiSrcLAJE, 1800-186-i, was the author of a large number 
of novels. 

Miss Sinclair was the daughter of Sir John Sinclair; she was amanuensis to her 
father, and for many years wrote from five to six hours daily to his dictation. Not- 
withstanding this heavy tax upon her energies, she found time and courage for liter- 
ary work, and 23roduced a large number of original and attractive volumes. Without 
rising to the rank of a first-class writer, she yet attained great excellence, and is most 
deservedly popular. Her works, as quoted bj' Allibone, are twenty-six in number, 
and many of them are in two and three volumes each. The following are some of 
those best known: Charlie Seymour, Modern Accomplishments, Modern Society, 
Modern Flirtations, Jane Bouverie, Lord and Lady Harcourt, Beatrice, Holiday House, 
Nursery Plutarch, Memoriea of the English Bible, etc. 



THE NOVELISTS. 539 



Elizabeth Sewell. 

Elizabeth M. Sewell, 1815 , sister of tlie Eev. William 

Sewell, is the author of a large number of works, — between thirty 
and forty, — on a great variety of subjects. 

The following are the titles of some of her best known novels : Amy Herbert ; Mar- 
garet Percival ; The Earl's Daughter; Katherine Ashton. A uniform edition of her 
Tales and Stories has been published in 9 vols., Svo. She has written also a consid- 
erable number of school-books : Child's First History of Greece ; Child's First His- 
tory of Rome ; Dictation Exercises ; besides an elaborate work, The Principles of 
Education, drawn from Nature and Revelation, and applied to Female Education in 
the Upper Classes, 2 vols., Svo. Another large class of her writings are those of a re- 
ligious cast, such as. Readings for Every Day in Lent ; Readings for a Month Prepara- 
tory to Confirmation; Thoughts for the Holy Week ; Preparations for the Holy Com- 
munion, etc. 

Miss Catherixe Marsh, 1820 , a native of Colchester, has written several books 

which have had a powerful influence both on the opinions and the practice of the 
religious world. Among these may be named English Hearts and English Hands, or 
The Railway and the Trenches ; and Memorials of Capt. Hedley Ticars. 

Miss Yonge. 

Miss Chahlotte Maey Yoxge, 1823 , first attained celebrity 

by her novel, The Heir of Eedclyife. 

Miss Tonge is the daughter of an English army officer, W. C. Tonge, who was also 
a magistrate for Hampshire. Her novels are of the religious cast, inculcating High 
Church principles. Her leading characters are clearly individualized, and she has 
considerable dramatic power. Her chief defect as an artist is her want of condensa- 
tion. Her stories lose power by being too much spun out. She began publishing in 
1848, and has kept up a pretty regular stream of books ever since. The number of 
her publications is over fifty, many of them 3 vol. novels. The following are some of 
those best known: The Heir of Redclyffe, Daisy Chain, The Clever "Woman of the 
Family, Hopes and Fears, Heartsease, The Two Guardians, etc. Xone of them are 
equal to the first. She has written also numerous historical works, Cameos from 
English History, etc. 

Mrs. Wood. 

Mrs. Henry Wood (Miss Ellen Price), 1820 , has been very 

prolific as a writer of novels. 

She has been a contributor to many magazines and periodicals, among them Bent- 
ley's Miscellany, Good Words, Once a Week, etc., and published a large number of 
novels which are read both in her own country and iu the United States. Some, in- 
deed, have been translated into French. Mrs. Wood's place is among those authors 
who write for the average reader, and who, consequently, produce nothing above the 
average style. The best known of her works, perhaps, are Danesbury House (a prize 
temperance-novel). East Lynne (which has been frequently dramatized), Trevlyn Hold, 
St. Martin's Eve, Ors'eth Cottage, Red Court Farm, etc. 



540 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Mrs. Wood was born in Worcester, and is the daughter of the late Thomas Price, a 
leading manufacturer of that place. She was early married to Mr. Henry Wood, a 
gentleman connected with the shipping trade. 

Mrs. Margaret Oliphant, 1820 , a native of Scotland, has written several pop- 
ular works : Miss Majoribanks, Madonna Mary, Minister's Wife, Katie Stewart, The 
Perpetual Curate, The Quiet Heart, Zaidee, Magdalen Hepburn, The Athelings, Adam 
Graeme, Lilliesleaf, The Rose of Merkland, Sundays, Orphans, Passages in the Life of 
Mrs. Margaret Maitland, The Days of my Life, an Autobiography, Life of Edward 
Irving, etc. 

Lady Georgiana Fullerton, 1814 , a daughter of Earl 

Granville, and the wife of Capt. Alexander FuUerton, is one of the 
most successful of recent English novelists. 

Iler principal novels are the following : Ellen Middleton ; Grantly Manor ; Lady Bird ; 
Too Strange not to be True ; A Stormy Life ; Mrs. Gerald's Niece. " The author is per- 
haps too elaborate in her diction, and is stirred too often by ambition for the super- 
fine, to catch that flowing felicity of style which should be the aim of the novelist, — 
a style in which sentences should only represent thought or fact, and never dazzle 
away attention from the matter they convey. But with some faults of manner, and 
some blunders in plot, the novel e%-inces considerable dramatic power, and has a num- 
ber of striking characters. The interest is well sustained, though rapidity of move- 
ment in the story is ever subsidiary to completeness of delineation in characters."' — 
[Vhij>ple. 

Mrs. Gore. 

Mrs. Catherine Grace Gore, 1799-1861, was one of the most 
voluminous novelists of her day. 

Mrs. Gore's novels are mostly stories of fashionable life, and are pronounced by for- 
eign critics to be fair representations of English society among the middle and upper 
classes. Her stories are interesting, involving always a pretty love affair, but are 
rarely tragical, and never fraught with the burden of any great human want or woe. 
She is not a reformer, or a propagandist, political or religious, but simply a writer of 
good, entertaining, harmless love-stories. She has written more than sixty of these 
regular three-volume novels, besides several volumes of plaj's and poems. The fol- 
lowing are the titles of a few of her novels : Castles in the Air; Cecil, or The Adven- 
tures of a Coxcomb ; Mothers and Daughters ; Peers and Parvenues ; Theresa March- 
mont, or The Maid of Honor, etc., etc. 

Marian Evans — ''^ George Eliot.*' 

Mrs. Marian C. (Evans) Lewes, 1820 , best known by her 

assumed name of George Eliot, belongs to the first class of English 
novelists. Scarcely any works of fiction of the present day show 
greater originality, or power, or higher artistic finish. 

Mrs. Lewes is the wife of the author, G. H. Lewes : she achieved, however, her great 
distinction as a writer before her marriage. Her principal Morks are : Adam Bede ; 



ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS. 541 

The Mill on the Floss : Romola ; Felix Holt the Radical ; Scenes of Clerical Life ; Silas 
Marner ; The Spanish Gipsy, a Poem. 

Mrs. Gaskell. 

Mes. Elizabeth C. (Stevenson) Gaskell, 1822-1866, was a resi- 
dent of Manchester, the wife of a Unitarian minister. 

Mrs. Gaskell was one of the best of the lady novelists of the present generation ; 
and in her subjects, and the vigor of her delineations, came nearer than any other of 
them to her friend Charlotte Bronte. The following is a list of her works : Mary 
Barton, a Tale of Manchester Life ; Ruth, a Novel ; The Moorland Cottage ; North and 
South; Crawford; Sylvia's Lovers; Cousin Phillis ; A Dark Night's Work ; My Lady 
Ludlow; Right at Last; Wives and Daughters; Life of Charlotte Brontg. 

Miss Muloeh. 

Miss Dinah Maria Muloch, 1826 , is the author of several 

novels which have enjoyed a great and deserved popularity. 

She is a native of England, and was married, in 1865, to Mr. George Lillie Craik. 
The scenes in her books are pre-eminently scenes of domestic life, and the characters 
are interesting and life-like. The descriptions are jwrhaps a trifle too much drawn 
out. The best of her works are: John Halifax, Gentleman; The Ogilvies; Olive; 
Agatha's Husband ; The Woman's Kingdom ; and A Brave Lady. Miss Muloch's forte 
lies in the development of her characters, showing how the same general events tend 
to invigorate a healthy miu(l and to crush the weak and self-indulgent. 



III. "WRITERS ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS. 

Carlyle. 

Thomas Carlyle, 1795 , is pre-eminent among the 

writers of his generation for the independence and vigor of 
his thoughts, and for the air of supreme authority with 
which his opinions are uttered. 

Mr. Carlyle is a native of Scotland. He was educated at the Uni- 
versity of Edinburgh, and for some years engaged in teaching, but 
about the age of twenty-nine gave himself up wholly to literature and 
authorship. 

Mr. Carlyle's first publications were contributions to Brewster's Edinburgh Ency- 
clopedia, for which he wrote the articles on Montesquieu, Montaigne, Nelson, Norfolk, 
and the two Pitts. About the same time he wrote an Essay on Joanna Baillie's Phiys 
on the Passions, and a translation of Legendre's Geometry. His next work was a 
translation of Goethe's Wilhelm Meister, which was followed by a Life of Schiller. 
The preparation of these two works seems to have given to his thoughts and studies 
that strong bent towards German ideas and modes of expression which have formed 
such a prominent feature in his writings ever since. 
46 



542 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE MPOR AEIES . 

This feature was especially marked in his next work, Sartor Resartus. professerlly 
a translation from a German treatise on the philosophy of clothes. In this curious 
miscellany, under a quaint form, and in a diction and phraseology strangely outland- 
ish, the author ventilates his opinions on a great variety of subjects, and with a fresh- 
ness, vigor, and acuteness of thought, that show on every page the master-hand. Sar- 
tor Resartus gave Carlyje his tirst strong hold upon the public mind ; and he has been 
recognized ever since as a leading force in the world of opinion. 

His subsequent works have been Chartism ; Hero- Worship; Past and Present ; Let- 
ters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell ; Life of John Sterling ; Latter-Day Pamphlets ; 
The French Revolution ; and Life of Frederick the Great. He has published also five 
volumes of Miscellanies. 

Mr. Carlyle has a great contempt for weakness, either in individuals or in races, and 
a corresponding admiration for strength, and is not far from saying, in so many words, 
that might makes right. Indeed, his special delight is in saying and boldly avowing 
whatever is glaringly paradoxical. His chief heroes, above all other men, are Moham- 
med, Cromwell, Napoleon, and Frederick the Great. He is provokingly arrogant and 
dogmatic, and yet he charms and fascinates. lie calls us all fools, blockheads, knaves, 
scoundrels, and yet he does it with such an imperial air. that we all like to hear him ; 
we listen to his voice as though it were verily that of Jupiter Tonans speaking audibly 
from Mount Olympus. 

Ruskin. 

John Euskin, 1819 , is the father of the modern English 

school of art-criticism, and one of the greatest masters of English 
prose. 

Mr. Ruskin is a native of London. He studied at Oxford, and received lessons in 
drawing and painting from Copley, Fielding, and others. 

The majority of critics and even of ordinary readers are not disposed to assent un- 
qualifiedly to the critical dictation of Mr. Ruskin ; yet no one certainly has given such 
an impetus to the cause of art, no one has succeeded in interesting so many readers 
in matters of art, and arousing them to active thought and inquiry on the subject. 
No one has done more to free art from conventionalism and superficiality, and to re- 
veal its spirit and its depth. At the same time, Mr. Ruskin labors under many serious 
defects. He is diffuse and digressive, at times even to incoherency. He is illogical, 
overbearing in statement, a fanatical high-priest of art. Nor is he even willing to 
abide by his own vocation, but makes it a point of starting for all kinds of digression 
upon literature, philosophy, morals, etc. 

In general it may be said that his morals are sound, but his philosophisings are 
thin, and his literary criticisms untrustworthy. Some of them, indeed, are so absurdly 
incorrect as to provoke meiTiment. He never seems to have attained, for instance, 
any idea of the dramatic element in poetry. With all his errors and shortcomings, 
however, Ruskin's services in behalf of art are too great and too manifold to be un- 
justly underrated. 

WorJ£S. — His earliest work was Modern Painters, intended to show their superiority 
over the ancients in landscape painting. This was followed by the Seven Lamps of 
Architecture, i. e., the seven moral or psychical principles of architecture. In 1851 
appeared what will probably be regarded by future generations as his greatest work. 
The Stones of Venice, accompanied by examples of Tenetian architecture. Ruskin 
devoted to this work years of patient toil and study, copying on the spot all the chief 
architectural features of the city. Many of the originals have already disappeared, or 



ON LITEEATURE AND POLITICS. 543 

will soou disappear, through decay and neglect or in the march of so-called modern 
improvement. 

In addition to these greater works, Ruskin has delivered and published a great 
number of lectures on various art-subjects. One of his most interesting sketches is 
that on Pre-Raphaelitism. He has also prepared an excellent manual on the Elements 
of Drawing, and a similar one on Perspective. His latest work, under the fanciful 
title of the Queen of the Air, is a study of the Greek myths of cloud and storm. His 
lectures on Work, TraflBc, and War, by their unjust strictures on the American Civil 
War, just then closed, gave no little offence to his American admirers. 

Mr. Ruskin has one idol in art, and that idol is Turner. No one is disposed, of 
course, to deny Turner's supremacy in landscape painting. But Ruskin's incessant 
harping upon Turner's excellence becomes at times intolerable. 

Ruskin's powers of description, although often over-exerted, are very great, and his 
style has the great merit of suggestiveness. No one with a cultivated mind can read 
at random in Ruskin's writings without seiziug and carrying off some idea capable 
of indefinite development by the reader himself. This it is, after all, which consti- 
tutes the lasting merit of Ruskin's works. 

Max Muller. 

Frederick Max Muller, 1823 , has done a signal public ser- 
vice, and has connected himself indissolubly with English letters, by 
his successive works on the Science of Language. 

Prof. Muller is a native of Germany, and the son of the well-known German poet 
Wllhelm Miiller, commonly called Maler Muller, because of his being both painter 
and poet. Max Mllller has passed by far the greater part of his life in England, and 
has written nearly all his works in English. The foundations of his oriental re- 
searches, however, were laid in Germany and France, under the teachings of Brock- 
haus, Bopp, Riickert, Burnouf, and others. 

His works may be grouped, in a general way, into two classes: those on compara- 
tive philology and mythology, and those on Sanscrit proper. The latter are embodied 
in the edition of the Rig-Veda, made by Muller for the East India Company ; his trans- 
lation of the Rig- Veda, of which the first volume has appeared ; his Sanscrit Gram- 
mar; his History of Ancient Sanscrit Literature; and a number of scattered essays 
and contributions. As a writer on comparative philology and mythology, he is best 
known by his Lectures on the Science of Language, in two volumes, and by a number 
of articles that, for a long while, were scattered through reviews and scientific jour- 
nals, but are now collected into a series of volumes entitled Chips from a German 
Workshop. 

Max Miiller occupies the chair of Modern Languages at Oxford, and is the most 
eminent Sanscrit scholar that P]ngland has possessed since the death of Wilson. He 
is here an original investigator, and his contributions to Sanscrit philology are second 
to those of none. In comparative philology, however, lie is not so strong. His ser- 
vices in this branch are confined chiefly to conuecting and popularizing the results 
of the labors of such men as Kiihn, Oppert, Steinthal, Curtius, Julien, Wilhelra 
Humboldt. No one, perhaps, has done more to diffuse a knowledge of the general 
principles of philology and mythology than Max MUller. His style is clearness itself, 
and he is successful in investing even very abstruse subjects with a charm for the lay 
reader, 

Edward Young, , of Cambridge, has called in question the dogmas on 

art propounded by Ruskin and others of the Pre-Rafi"aelite School. -Mr. Young is 



644 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

indeed the leader of the Anti-Ruskin partj"^ in art-criticism. He has published Pre- 
Raffaelitism, a popular inquiry into some newly-asserted principles connected with 
the philosophy, religion, and revolution of Art; The Harp of God, twelve Lectures on 
Liturgical Music, its import, history, present state, and reformation ; Art, its constitu- 
tion and capacities. 

Sip George Corne^wall Le^A^is. 

Sir George Cornewall Lewis, 1806 , is among the ablest 

and most original critics of the day, especially on historical subjects. 

Sir George studied at Oxford, and was admitted to the bar, but never practised. 
He has held several important oflBces under the English Government, among them the 
Chancellorship of the Exchequer, and he was for a brief time editor of the Edinburgh 
Review. 

He has translated from the German Boeckh's Public Economy of Athens ; K. 0. 
Miiller's Dorier ; the first half of K. 0. Miiller's History of the Literature of Greece, 
(from the author's MS.); the latter half was translated by J. W. Donaldson, who also 
completed the work left unfinished in the original. Besides these translations. Sir 
George has published a treatise On the Use and Abuse of Political Terms, On the 
Methods of Observation and Reasoning in Politics, and An Inquiry into the Credibil- 
ity of Early Roman History. 

Sir George is a vigorous writer and able scholar, belonging to the so-called destruc- 
tive school of criticism. lie rejects the entire early history of Rome, even Niebuhr's 
theory of it, as utterly without historic evidence. Whether or not future research 
may lead to a different conclusion, it is at all events certain that Sir George Lewis's 
fresh and independent spirit will always exercise a wholesome influence upon readers 
and scholars. 

Prof. Latham. 

Egbert Gordon Latham, F. E. S., 1812 , holds a high rank 

among English philologists. 

Prof. Latham is a native of Lincolnshire. He was educated at Eton and Cambridge ; 
and in 1840 was appointed Professor of English Literature in University College, 
London. 

Dr. Latham has published a number of works on philology and contributions to 
scientific journals. His best known writings are : A Translation of Tegner's Axel ; 
A Treatise on the English Language ; An Elementary English Grammar, for the use 
of schools; Man and his Migrations; Ethnology of Europe; and (just completed) 
Latham's and Todd's Johnson's Dictionary, in 4 vols., 4to. Latham's contributions 
to the study and to the right teaching of the English language are of great practical 
as well as scientific value. 

William Mure, 1799-1860, gained distinction as a writer on the 
literature of Greece. 

He was a native of Scotland, and was educated at the University of Edinburgh, and 
subsequently in Germany. Colonel Mure, as he is generally styled, is the author of 
a Journal of a Tour in Greece and the Ionian Islands, which was received with great 
favor. 

His chief wx)rk is A Critical History of the Language and Literature of Greece, from 



ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS. 545 

the Earliest Period to tlie Death of Solon, in 5 vols. This is a most valuahie contribu- 
tion to the study of Greek literature in its formative period, and covers the so-called 
Homeric or Epic period. Col. Mure takes very decided ground against the views of 
Wolf and his followers, and maintains strenuously Homeric unity. The work has 
been supplemented recently, but not superseded, by Gladstone's Studies on Homer, and 
the two constitute the most complete course of critical reading for the English student. 
Col. Mure was honored in 1855 with the election to the Lord-Rectorship of the Uni- 
versity of Glasgow. 

Craik. 

George L. Craik, 1799-1866, was Professor of English Literature 
and History, in Queen's College, Belfast. 

His writings are numerous, and are extremely valuable for their accuracy and their 
many beauties of style and diction. He was one of the leading contributors to the 
Penny Cyclopaedia, in the department of history and biography. He also wrote a 
large part of Knight's Pictorial History of England, 8 vols., r. 8vo, contributing to it 
the articles on religion, commerce, industry, and literature. His separate publica- 
tions are : Romance of the Peerage, 4 vols., 8vo ; Bacon, his Writings and Philosophy, 
3 vols., ISmo ; Spenser and his Poetry, 3 vols., ISmo ; Paris and its Historical Scenes, 
2 vols., 18mo; Evils of Popular Tumults, ISmo ; History of British Commerce, 3 vols., 
18mo; Pursuit of Knowledge under Difficulties, 5 vols., 18mo; History of English 
Literature and Language, 6 vols., 18mo. The last-named work has been republished 
in the United States in two large vols., 8vo, and is one of the very best works on the 
subject yet printed. 

" Scrupulous accuracy, unwearied research, and sound criticism, united with an 
ardent desire for the safe and gradual advance of all that may practically improve 
the condition of society, are the leading characteristics of Mr. Craik's writings." — 
KnigMs Eng. Cydapsedia, 

James Mill. 

James Mill, 1773-1836, was a writer of note on subjects connected 
with statesmanship and political economy. 

Mr. Mill belongs properly to the preceding chapter, but he is mentioned here on 
account of the connection of himself and his opinions with his illustrious son, John 
Stuart Mill. 

Mr. Mill was a native of Scotland. He studied at the University of Edinburgh, and 
afterwards removed to Loudon, and became a writer for the reviews, chiefly the 
Edinburgh. 

Mr. Mill's chief work is his History of British India, in 5 vols. It is conceived 
and written in a manner exactly the reverse of Sir John Malcolm's history. Sir 
John's style is lively and agreeable, that of Mr. Mill is heavy; Sir John extols the 
administration of the East India Company, Mr. Mill systematically exposes all its 
faults and errors. Mill's history is the better work of the two; it is conceived in a 
more philosophic spirit, and is also more accurate. Notwithstanding the freedom of 
its criticisms, it obtained for the author the position of Head of the India Correspond- 
ence in the India House. 

A number of Mr. Mill's essays, which appeared originally in the supplement to the 
Encyclopaedia Britannica, were collected and published in book-form, in 1828. They 
are upon Liberty of the Press, Jurisprudence, Prison Reform, Education, etc. Their 
46* 2K 



546 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

republication was the occasion of a lively controversy between Macaulay and Ben- 
tham, carried on in the Edinburgh and Westminster Reviews. Mill was an intimate 
friend of Benlham, and an inculcator of iiis views. He published also the Elements of 
Political Economy, 1821, and an Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind, 1829. 

John Stuart Mill. 

John Stuart Mill,, 1806 , a son of James Mill, the historian 

of India, was educated in London, entered the India service, and suc- 
ceeded his father as Head of the Indian Correspondence. 

John Stuart Mill has been a contributor to the leading reviews, and was, for several 
years, co-editor of the Westminster. He has also taken a prominent part in politics, 
and been honored with an election to Parliament. He belongs to the radical, pror 
gressive party in England. His essay on the State of Philosophy in England and his 
review of Whately's Logic attracted great attention. 

Besides his scattered pieces, Mr. Mill has edited Jeremy Bentham's Rationale of 
Judicial Evidence, and published the following works: A System of Logic, 2 vols. ; 
Principles of Political Economy, 2 vols.; An Essay On Liberty; and, very recently, 
An Essay On the Subjection of Woman. 

John Stuart Mill is the most prominent living writer in England on philosophy 
and political economy. Wliat final position he may occupy in the realms of thought 
and letters cannot yet be pronounced. Political reform has advanced so rapidly of 
late, the questions of political power and land-tenure and church establishment are 
assuming such practical shapes in England, the sympathy of the English laboring- 
classes with the Communist movement in France is becoming so pronounced, that it 
is impossible to foresee where a reformer and an agitator of reform. Like Mill, may 
stand in a few years from now. 

As a writer on philosophical or abstract subjects, no one has ever surpassed Mr. 
Mill for clearness and cogency of statement. As a scholar, his reputation is great and 
well founded. As a thinker, he is clear-headed and earnest. Whether or not his 
views are- sound, still remains to be proven. Many, even of the same party, fear that 
they are too ultra, too theoretical to be applied with safety to practical subjects. His 
treatise on the Subjection of Woman is undoubtedly justified as a protest against the 
legal status of woman in England. But its positive side, the claims which it puts 
forth in behalf of woman's intellectual and artistic equality with man, must be re- 
garded as anything but established. In political economj-, Mr. Mill is a champion of 
free-trade, and a fearless opponent of the present absorption of land in England by a 
few enormously wealthy owners, 

Rt. Hon. James Wilson, M. P., 1805-1860, was born at Hawick, Scotland. After 
failing as a tradesman, he turned his attention to political economy, and bcame very 
distinguished; both as a writer on that subject, and as a political administrator. He 
began in ISAS Tlie Economist, which he conducted for many years with marked abil- 
ity, and he has received from the Government a series of important appointments con- 
nected with the administration of the finances, the last being that of Financial mem- 
ber of the Council of India. His career in India in putting its finances in a healthy 
and vigorous condition was one of brilliant success, though cut short by his death 
after being there only a year. He published Capital, Currency, and Banking; a col- 
lection of articles from The Economist; The Revenues, or What Should the Chancel- 
lor Do? Fluctuations of Currency, Commerce, and Manufactures; Influence of the 
Corn Laws ; Financial Measures for India. 



ON LITERATURE AKD POLITICS. 547 

John Kamsey MacCulloch, 1789-1864, a native of Scotland, con- 
tributed to the daily press and to the reviews a great number of arti- 
cles upon politico-economical subjects. 

MacCulloch's principal works are: The Principles of Political Economj^; a Diction- 
ary of Commerce and Commercial Navigation ; and a Dictionary, Geographical, Statis- 
tical, and Historical. He also edited Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, and Ricardo's 
Works. He was a bold, uncompromising advocate of free-trade, and aided materially 
in the introduction of that system into England. 

Sir Travees Twiss, D. C. L., 1818 , a distinguished writer on political economy 

and international law, was born in Westminster, and gi-aduated at Oxford, with high 
honors, in 1830. He has held successively a number of important posts : Professor of 
Political Economy at Oxford, 1842-47 ; Professor of International Law in King's Col- 
lege, London, 185-'-55 ; Regius Professor of Civil Law in the University of Oxford, 
1855 ; Advocate-General, 1867, etc. Besides epitomizing Niebuhr's History of Rome, 
and giving a critical edition of Livy, Dr. Twiss has written : A View of the Progress 
of Political Economy since the Sixteenth Century; Certain Tests of a Thriving Popu- 
lation; The Law of Nations Considered as Independent Political Communities, 2 vols., 
8vo ; Letters Apostolic of Pope Pius IX., considered with Reference to the Law of 
England and the Law of Eui'ope, etc. 

Thomas P. Thompson, 1783-1869, a distinguished English officer, was a writer on 
political economy. He was born at Hull, and educated at Cambridge. He served in 
the army in South America, Spain, and India, attaining the rank of Major-General, 
and was three times elected to Parliament. He was one of the proprietors of the 
Westminster Review, and through it and through his books advocated free-trade, the 
abolishment of slavery, and other projects of that kind. His chief publications are : 
The True Theory of Rent, in opposition to Ricardo; An Exposition of Fallacies, on 
the same subject as the preceding ; Catechism of the Corn Laws, an arsenal from which 
the Anti-Corn Law League drew many of its weapons; Catechism on the Currency; 
Geometry without Axioms, an attempt to prove the propositions in the first book of 
Euclid without resorting to axioms or postulates. 

Gladstone. 

Et. Hon. William E. Gladstone, 1809 , great equally as a 

statesman, an author, and an orator, has risen by slow but sure degrees, 
through the various stages of advancement, until in 1868 he became 
the Prime Minister of the Crown. 

Mr. Gladstone took the highest honors for scholarship in the University at the time 
of his graduation in 1831, and he has excelled in whatever he has undertaken since. 
As a parliamentary speaker, he holds a rank somewhat like that of William Pitt, in 
a former generation, and he is unmatched by any of his contemporaries except per- 
haps John Bright. His great speech on the Budget, in 1860, for clearness of state- 
ment, force of reasoning, intimate acquaintance with the intricacies of finance, and 
skill in making them plain to the common understanding, was certainly equal to any 
eff"orts of Pitt in his palmiest days. The London Quarterly Hevicw, in referring to this 
speech, says: "We find ourselves in the enchanted regions of pure Gladstonisrii, — 
that terrible combination of relentless logic and dauntless imagination. We soar into 



548 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE M PO R A EIES . 

the empyrean of finance. Everything is on a colossal scale of grandeur, — all-em- 
bracing free-trade, abysses of deficit, and mountains of income tax." He was opposed 
to the Crimean war in 1855, and to the Chinese war in 1857, and he has steadfastly 
advocated free-trade. His greatest and boldest parliamentary measure was the dis- 
establishment of the Episcopal Church in Ireland, which, after earnest discussion and 
repeated reverses, was finally' carried in 1869. The " Loudon Times " calls this " the 
greatest and boldest act of legislation of modern times.'' 

Like several of the other great statesmen of Great Britain of the present day, :Mr. 
Gladstone, in the midst of his intense parliamentary labors, has found time to employ 
his pen on subjects of general concern. His works, though not numerous, are in ilic 
highest degree scholarly and able, and sufiicient of themselves to give him rank 
among the great writers of the age. They are the following; The State in its Rela- 
tion to the Church; Church Principles Considered in their Results ; Juventus Mmidi, 
the Gods of Men of the Heroic Age ; Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age ; and a 
great number of Addresses and Letters on public occasions. 

Nassau "William Sexior, 1T90-1SG4, was educated at Oxford, where he subsequently 
became Professor of Political Economj'. He also rose to distinction at the English 
bar. Mr. Senior's works are chiefly on political and politico-economical subjects. 
Among them are treatises and lectures On Political Economy, On the Transmission 
of the Precious Metals, On the Rate of Wages. On Population, etc. Some of his literary 
efi"orts are well known, such as his article in the Edinburgh Review on Uncle Tom's 
Cabin, his Journal of Travels in Turkey and Greece, his Biographical Sketches, and 
his Essays on Fiction. 

Richard Cobden, 1804-1865, was a prominent politician, who especially distin- 
guished himself by his agitation for the repeal of the Corn Laws, and of other legisla- 
tive reforms. He published a pamphlet, England, Ireland, and America ; another, 
Russia ; How Wars are got up in India ; AVhat Xext ? Speeches, etc. 

Joseph Kat, , a Ban-ister-at-Law, and a graduate of Cambridge, under a 

travelling commission from the Senate of the University, visited various countries for 
the purpose of exploring the state of public education and of crime. His publica- 
tions, most of which were printed in the United States, excited a good deal of discus- 
sion. The following are the chief: Education of the Poor in England and Europe; 
The Social Condition and Education of the People in England and Eui-ope. 



Goldwin Smith. 

GoLDT\^N Smith, 1823 , formerly Professor of History in the 

University of Oxford, lias attained distinction as a writer on political 
and historical subjects. 

Mr. Smith was educated at Eton and at Oxford. In the latter place he became tu- 
tor and Regius Professor of Modern History. He also acted as secretary to the par- 
liamentary commission on the revision of the Oxford statutes. In 1864 he visited the 
United States, in 1866 resigned his professorship, and in 1868, when the Cornell Uni- 
versity was opened, he became professor of English history in that institution. 

His inaugural Lecture, delivered at Oxford after he had been appointed Regius Pro- 
fessor, is an admirable survey of the province of the historian. His several Lectures 
on History have been collected and republished in one volume, and form a very sue- 



ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS. 549 

cinct and vigorous statement of the claims and method of the study. Two of his 
most valuable monographs are the pamphlet entitled, Does the Bible Sanction Slavery, 
published in 1863, and the sketch of the lives of Pym, Cromwell, and Pitt, published 
in 1867. The former, although no longer of practical value to Americans, is still im- 
portant as a mile-stone, so to speak, in the march of ideas. 

In 1866 Mr. Smith delivered an address on The Civil War in America, at Manches- 
ter. The Empire, a series of letters published in the Daily News, is also from his pen. 
Many other sketches and essays by him now lie scattered through the columns of the 
journals and reviews, awaiting the collector. The article on Carlyle, in Putnam's for 
1869, is also by him. 

Mr. Smith is a man of great culture and attainments. His classical scholarship is 
of the highest order, as v,as shown by his taking the Chancellor's prize for Latiu 
verse while a student at Oxford. Several of his metrical translations have been printed 
in Bohn's Anthology. As a writer of vigorous and elegant English prose he can be said 
to have scarcely a superior. His sketches of the three English statesmen will stand 
as a model of the historical essay. In politics Mr. Smith is a reformer, if not a radi- 
cal. The ballot-box, church reform, the abolition of University tests, human freedom, 
have found, of late, no abler champion. 

Since locating himself at Cornell University, he has delivered, in addition to his 
regular lectures on English history, occasional lectures on topics of the day. Two of 
these were on Oxford, and one was on England. They have not been published. 
Those who had the privilege of hearing them will readily admit their merits. The 
one on England, in particular, Avas a model of condensed description. Within the 
scanty limits of an hour and a half, the lecturer succeeded in conveying an easy, 
graphic, and full desci-iption of the England of the present in its physical and social 
aspects, about as it would strike the eye of the tourist of culture. The celebrated 
lecture in reply to Charles Sumner's speech on the rejection of Reverdy Johnson's 
Alabama treaty, was also delivered at Ithaca. It occasioned much ill feeling at 
the time, which was due largely to misunderstanding, and which has since passfed 
away. 

Sir James Stephen, 1789-1859, was a writer of high repute on 
historical subjects. 

Sir James studied at Oxford, and was admitted to the English bar. He occupied 
several high posts under Government, and from 1849 until his death was Eegius Pro- 
fessor of Modern History at Cambridge. He also occupied the chair of Modern His- 
tory and Political Economy at Haileybury College. He is the author of several essays 
in ecclesiastical biography and other subjects, first published in the Edinburgh Re- 
view, and afterwards republished in book -form in 1849. His chief work, however, is 
his Lectures on the History of France, published in 1851. This has been, ever since 
its appearance, a favorite book of students of French history. It gives the leading 
features and underlying principles of French history in a clear and animated form, 
and contains much valuable discussion of theories. 



Earl Russell. 

Lord John (now Earl) Russell, 1792 , though actively en- 
gaged in State affairs, has found the leisure, like many other promi- 
nent English statesmen, to cultivate letters. 



550 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPOK A RIES . 

Earl Russell is the youngest son of the Duke of Bedford. He was educated at 
Westminster and at the University of Edinburgh. He has been throughout his long 
political career a prominent and consistent champion of the Whig party. He is re- 
ported to have had the principal share in the composition of the celebrated Reform 
Bill of IS'i-z ; he also co-operated actively, in 18i5, in the repeal of the Corn Laws. 
He has twice held (lS4&-18o'2 and 1865-6,) the highest position of power attainable by 
a subject — that of prime minister, and has been honored with numerous other ap- 
pointments. 

As an author. Earl Russell is known chiefly by his Essay on the History of the 
English Constituti(m, which is one of the very best manuals on the subject, his Me- 
moirs of the Affairs of Europe from the Peace of Utrecht, his Life and Times of Charles 
James Fox, and his Correspondence of Fox. He has published some other historical 
works of interest, and one or two poems and stories which have not been received fa- 
vorably. Earl Russell has not imagination enough to succeed as a poet or narrator. 
His tiilent is rather that of the clear, straightforward statement of historical facts 
and truths. His great experience as a statesman and party leader enables him to ap- 
preciate accurately party agitations and manoeuvrings in the past. 



The Earl of Derby. 

Edward Geoffrey Smith Stanley, Earl of Derby, 1799-1869, 
a distinguished English statesman, and leader of the Tory party, 
gained great distinction also in the field of authorship. 

He was educated at Eton and at Oxford, and was distinguished at both places by 
his scholarship. Besides some minor works, he published The Iliad of Homer in 
English Blank Verse. Derby's Homer is considered far superior to Pope's, and cer- 
tainly is one of the best, if not the best, ever published. Such a literary achieve- 
ment is the more remarkable, as it was executed amidst the cares and excitements 
of political life. 

David Urquhaet, 1805 , was born in Cromarty, and educated at Oxford. He 

was appointed in 1835 Secretary to the Turkish Embassy, and was a Member of Par- 
liament from 1817 to 1852. He was a warm opponent of the foreign policy of Pal- 
merston, particularly in Turkish affairs, affirming stoutly that the Turkish empire 
had elements of vitality ; that it was capable of being brought up to the standard of 
other European states, and was worth the experiment. Most of his writings are on 
this subject : Turkey and its Resources ; England, France, Russia, and Turkey ; Spirit 
of the East, a Journal of Travel; Observations on European Turkey; The Sultan 
Mahmoud and Mehemet Ali Pacha ; The Mystery of the Danube ; Letters and Essays 
on Russian Aggressions; Recent Events in the East ; The Occupants of the Crimea, 
etc. Mr. Urquhart has written also on various other topics of international con- 
cern. 

Sir James Emerso?! Tennent, 1804-1869, was born at Belfast, Ireland, and educated 
at Trinity College, Dublin. He studied law, but never practised. He entered Parlia- 
ment in 1832, and continued there for twentj' years. He held various important offices 
under the Government, one being that of Secretary to the Colonial Government of 
Ceylon. He published Letters from the j3Egean ; A History of Modern Greece, 2 vols., 
8vo; A Treatise on Copyright of Designs; Belgium, 2 vols., 8vo; Wine, its Use and 
Taxation ; Ceylon, 2 vols., 8vo ; The Story of the Guns, being a recommendation of 



ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS. 551 

the TVhitworth over the Armstrong; The Wild Elephant, and the Method of Captur- 
ing and Taming them. 

Professor Ai^exandee, Campbell Feaser, 1819 , is a man 

of note as a writer on metapliysics. 

Prof. Eraser is the son of a clergyman. He ■^\"as born in Argj'leshire, Scotland, and 
was a pupil of Sir William Hamilton's. He was elected Professor of Logic in New 
College, in 1846; became editor of the North British Review, in 1849; and on the 
death of Sir William Hamilton, in 1856, succeeded that distinguished philosopher as 
Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in the University of Edinburgh. Prof Fraser 
has published Essays in Philosophy ; and Rational Philosophy in History and m 
System. 

William Spalding, 1809-1859, was born in Aberdeen ; educated at Marischal College ; 
was Professor of Rhetoric in the University of Edinburgh from 1834 to 1845, and Pro- 
fessor of Logic, Rhetoric, and Metaphysics in the University of St. Andrew's, from 
1845 to 1859. He wrote A History of English Literature, 12mo ; An Introduction to 
Logical Science ; and Italy and the Italian Islands, 3 vols., 12mo. 

James F. Ferriek, 1808-1864, was a son-in-law of Professor John Wilson (the Chris- 
topher North of Blackwood). Mr. Ferrier was a native of Edinburgh. He became 
Professor of Moral Philosophy and Political Economy in the University of St. An- 
drew's, in 1845, He edited the Works of Prof. John Wilson, in 12 vols. He wrote a 
work of great originality and power: Institutes of Metaphysics, the Theory of 
Knowing and Being. " This is no ordinary book. If we mistake not, its publication 
will mark an epoch in the history of speculation in this country." 

Mr. E. S. Dallas published, in 1866, The Gay Science, 2 vols., 8vo, being an attempt 
to settle the first principles of criticism. It is a scholarly book, displaying extensive 
reading and research, and rare powers of discrimination. It is one of the most 
charming and original works on criticism that has yet appeared in English. The 
author, in his Preface, promises to follow up the work by two additional volumes, 
showing the application of his principles in the actual work of criticism. 

Lady Eden., 

Lady Emily Eden, 1795-1869, was an accomplished traveller and 
author. 

Lady Eden accompanied her brother, the Earl of Auckland, to India, when he Avent 
out as Governor-General in 1835, and remained with him till his return in 1841. After 
her return, she published an interesting volume. Portraits of the People and Princes 
of India. Another volume, the fruits of her India residence, was a volume of her 
letters, entitled Up the Country. A few years since she published two very popular 
novels. The Semi-Attached Couple, and The Semi-Detached House. 

Charles Wentworth Dilke, 1789-1864, was a contributor to the Westminster Re- 
view and other periodicals, and was for many j'ears editor and proprietor of the Lon- 
don Athenseum. He edited Old English Plays, 6 vols. — Sir Charles Wentworth 
Dilke, LL. D., 1810-1869, only son of the preceding, attained great eminence as a jour- 



552 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE MPOE ARIES. 

nalist and as a connoisseur in art. He was educated at Westminster and Cambridge, 
and was associated with his father for many years in editing the Athenseum. The last 
twenty years of his life were spent chiefly in art matters. He died at St. Petersburg. 
— Charles Wentwortu Dilke, grandson of the first named, and a Member of Par- 
liament, published in 1868 a valuable work, Greater Britain, describing the power and 
growth of the various English-speaking communities which, by colonization or other- 
wise, have sprung from Great Britain. Mr. Dilke belongs to the most advanced class 
of political reformers. 

Alfred Crowquill. 

Alfred Henry Forrester, better known as Alfred Crowquill, 

1805 , is an artist and a humorous writer, whose pencil and pen 

have contributed much to the public amusement. 

Mr. Forrester was engaged with Theodore Hook, Disraeli, and others, in the pro- 
duction of the Humorist Paper for Mr. Colburn. Afterwards he wrote for Bentley, 
in company with Dickens, Prout, Ingoldsby, Maginn, etc. He was the first illustrator 
of Punch and of the Illustrated News. Some of his separate works are the following : 
Comic English Gi-ammar; Comic Arithmetic; Railway Raillei-y ; St. George and the 
Dragon ; A Bundle of Crowquills ; Picture Fables; Gold, a Poem; Wanderings of a 
Pen and Pencil, a large antiquarian book, profusely illustrated. Mr. Forrester was 
born in London, and educated at a private institution in Islington, where he was a 
school-fellow of Capt. Marryat. He became a notaiy in the Royal Exchange, with 
which ofiice his family has been connected for a century and a half. He retired from 
business in 1839. Ills literary career began at the age of sixteen with contributions 
to the periodicals. Later in life he devoted himself to drawing, modelling, and engrav- 
ing, both on steel and wood, illustrating in this way the productions of his pea. 

Douglas Jerrold. 

Douglas Jerrold, 1803-1857, was one of the famous wits of this 
century. 

Mr. Jerrold was a native of Sheerness. He eutered the Royal Navy, but soon aban- 
doned it for letters. His contributions to the London Punch alone would serve to 
make him famous. No less popular are his comedies. The best known among them 
are Black -Eyed Susan and Nell Gwynne. Mrs. Caudle's Curtain Lectures and Punch's 
Complete Letter Writer have become proverbial. In 1854 appeared an edition of his 
collected works, in 8 vols., 12mo. Jerrold was also editor of The Heads of the People, 
The Illuminated Magazine, The Shilling Magazine, and Lloyd's Weekly. 

" A perusal of them [Jerrold's Works] serves to confirm our original opinion that 
their object is to advance the good-of mankind; that to this object there has been 
a devotion of rare skill, undoubted originality, imperturbable good-temper, concealed, 
perhaps, occasionally under apparent fierceness of phrase, and a force and flash of wit 
at once dazzling and delightful. A body of works more original, either in the artis- 
tic construction or in the informing spirit, has not been added to the national litera- 
ture of our time." — London Athenseum, 1854. (1293.) 

Mark Lemon, 1809-1870, a native of London, was editor of the London Punch from 
its first appearance until his death. He was also literary editor of The Illustrated 



ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE. 553 

London News. Besides his numerous contributions to these periodicals and to Dick- 
ens's Household Words, Lemon is the author of a large number of melodramas and 
farces, of which the best known, perhaps, are The Serious Family, The Ladies' Club, 
and The School for Tigers. He also published a fairy tale for children, and a collected 
volume of Prose and Verse. 

Mrs. Jameson, 

Mrs. Anna Jameson, 1797-1860, has a high reputation as a writer 
on art and literature. 

Mrs. Jameson was the daughter of Murphy, the painter-in-ordinary to the Princess 
Charlotte. She was separated from her husband in 1824. Her principal works are: 
Diary of an Ennuyee, Loves of the Poets, Characteristics of Women, Memoirs of Cele- 
brated Female Sovereigns, Lives of the Early Italian Painters, The Poetry of Sacred 
and Legendary Art. Mrs. Jameson's works have ever been held in high favor. They 
exhibit rare powers of insight combined with grace of expression and purity of senti- 
ment. Probably no other English female writer of her day is more read and quoted. 
In her Sacred and Legendary Art she has evinced her capacity for antiquarian re- 
seai'ch, while her Characteristics of Women is, according to Whipple, " A most elo- 
quent and passionate representation of Shakespeare's women, and in many respects ia 
an important contribution to critical literature." 



IV. WRITERS ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE. 

Sir William Hamilton. 

Sir William Hamilton, 1788-1856, was, at the time of 
his death, the acknowledged leader of English metaphysi- 
cians. 

Sir William was educated at Oxford. In 1821 he was appointed 
Professor of History in the University of Edinburgh ; and in 1836 
was called to the chair of Logic and Metaphysics in that institution. 

Hamilton is universally allowed to have been a man of uncommon erudition, and 
of equal clearness in thought and expression. His Lectures on Logic and Metaphys- 
ics, 2 vols., are the accepted text-books in nearly all American colleges. His original 
productions have appeared chiefly in the shape of essays in the Edinburgh Review, 
Besides these, he edited, with elaborate notes and dissertations, the works of Thomas 
Reid, and was engaged, at the time of his death, in the preparation of a similar edi- 
tion of the works of Dugald Stewart. 

"It would be difficult to name any contributions to a review which display such a 
despotic command of all the resources of logic and metaphysics as his articles in the 
Edinburgh Review on Cousin, Dr. Brown, and Bishop Whately. Apart from their 
scientific value, they should be read as specimens of intellectual power. They evince 
more intense strength of understanding than any other writings of the age; and in 
the blended merits of their logic, rhetoric, and learning, they may challenge compar- 
ison with the best works of any British metapliysician. He seems to have read every 
writer, ancient and modern, on logic and metaphysics, and is conversant with every 
47 



554 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

philosophical theory, from the lowest form of materialism to the most abstract devel- 
opment of idealism ; and yet his learning is not so remarkable as the thorough man- 
ner in which he has digested it, and the perfect command he h;is of all its stores. 
Everything that he comprehends, no matter how obstmse, he comprehends with the 
utmost clearness and employs with consummate skill. He is altogether the best trained 
reasoner of his time on abstract subjects." — K P. WTdj)ple, Essays and Reviews. 

J. D. MoRELL, , is a prominent philosophical writer of 

the present day. 

Morell's contributions to the science of philosophy are as follows : Historical and 
Critical View of the Speculative Philosophy of Europe in the Nineteenth Century; 
Lectures on the Philosophical Tendencies of the Age ; The Philosophy of Religion ; 
Elements of Psychology. Besides these separate works, Mr. Morell is also the author 
of the articles on National Education in the Encyclopedia Britannica.* His Historical 
and Critical Yiew has the merit of being the first comprehensive presentation in 
England of contemporaneous philosophical speculation on the continent. Mr. Morell 
is a clear thinker and writer, and an earnest worker in the cause of national education. 

Henry Longueville Mansel, 1820 , is favorably known as 

an able writer on intellectual philosophy. 

Mansel was educated at Oxford. He became Professor of Moral and Intellectual 
Philosophy, and afterwards Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History, in that Univer- 
sity ; and then Dean of St. Paul's, London. 

Mansel is the author of several metaphysical treatises and essays, and is widely 
known by his work On the Limits of Religious Thought, in which he develops Sir 
"William Hamilton's position that "the unconditioned is irrecognizable and inconceiv- 
able." He is also the author of the article on Metaphysics (since published sepa- 
rately) in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. 

Buckle. 

Henry Thomas Buckle, 1822-1862, acquired great celebrity by 
his work on the History of Civilization. 

Buckle was the son of a wealthy merchant, and came, by the death of his father, 
into the possession of an ample fortune at the age of eighteen. Having a great 
thirst for knowledge, he collected a large library, and devoted himself with intense 
zeal to study. 

In 1857, at the age of thirty-five, Buckle published the first volume of the great 
work which he had projected, A History of Civilization. This work, so daring in 
thought, and so beautiful in expression, created at once a profound impression wher- 
ever the English language was spoken. It was unmistakably infidel in its assump- 
tions ; and it supported them with such a fulness and beauty of illustration as to 
create for a time a feeling of alarm in the minds of many. The public were taken by 
surprise by the wealth of learning at his command, and at the same time fascinated 
by the quiet ease and elegance with which these stores of wealth were spread out be- 
fore them. 

His second and larger volume came out in 1861, but did not create the excitement 
produced by the first. People had had time to recover frorn the spell thi-own over 



ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE. 555 

them, and had found that his logic was by no means equal to his rhetoric. They 
could still admire his style, which for philosophical writing has indeed never been ex- 
celled; and yet could see that his reasoning was unmistakably weak. 

His health failing, Mr. Buckle travelled to the East in the hope of recovery, but died 
at Damascus, in the spring of 1862. 

His work, if carried out to completion on the plan proposed, would have been one 
of colossal proportions. As it is, it is a splendid fragment, which must ever com- 
mand respect, even from those who dissent from the conclusions of the author. 

Herbert Spencer. 

Herbert Spekcer, 1820 , is one of the most voluminous 

writers of the day on philosophical subjects. 

Mr. Spencer studied for the engineering profession, but abandoned it for a life of 
authorship. He belongs to the same infidel school as Buckle, Lecky, and Darwin. 
He has been a contributor to the great English quarterlies, chiefly to the Westmin- 
ster Review, and to some scientific journals. 

Mr. Spencer may be described in general terms as a Darwinist, seeking to ascertain 
by deduction the physical and psychical laws underlying social life, and to make 
them, instead of abstract speculation, the basis of philosophy. According to Mr. 
Spencer's views there is no such thing as metaphysics in the ordinary use of that 
term, no aiprlori construction of the world of thought out of the philosopher's own 
consciousness, but only a science of human life based upon broad and carefully pre- 
pared data, and treated like other inductive sciences. 

Mr. Spencer's principal works are : Social Statics, The Principles of Psychology, Edu- 
cation, First Principles, Principles of Biology, Classification of the Sciences, and Univer- 
sal Progress. His Essays have been collected and published in one volume. In education, 
also, Mr. Spencer is a radical, seeking to abolish all conventional tests of excellence, 
and to make education a real development of the several faculties of memorj', judg- 
ment, imagination, and observation, — a practical training for the pursuits of life. 

Mr. Spencer is a master of style, and pours upon his pages a wealth of illustration 
gathered through the most extensive reading, so that his works are fascinating to all 
interested in the subject. The originality and the straightforwardness of his views 
are not suited to make him a favorite with the general public ; but his followers, 
although not numerous, are enthusiastic in their admiration. 

Mr. W. E. H. Lecky is a philosophical writer of considerable prominence. His two 
works are A History of Rationalism in Europe, published in 1865, and A History of 
European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne, published in 1869. These works are 
enough to stamp Mr, Lecky as an able writer and thinker. 

The Duke of Argyle. 

George John Douglass Campbell, Duke of Argyle, 1823 , is 

an eminent British statesman, orator, and author. 

The Duke is an earnest advocate of the principles of the Church of Scotland, and 
he took an active part in the proceedings which led to its disruption. He published 
Presbytery Examined, giving a review of the ecclesiastical history of Scotland since 
the Reformation. In the House of Lords ho acts with the Liberal party, and he is an 



556 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPOK ARIES. 

earnest promoter of science, and of popular education. He has at different times 
been a member of the Cabinet, holding offices of gieat importance, and he was Presi- 
dent of the British Association in 1865. His latest work is a philosophical treatise on 
The Reign of Law, which has been very favorably received. 



Sir David Brewster. 

Sir David Beewster, LL. D., 1781-1868, a native of Scotland and 
a resident of Edinburgli, was one of tlie greatest experimental pliiloso- 
phers of the present century. 

While a student at the University of Edinburgh, Brewster became intimate with 
Dugald Stewart and Playfair. In conjunction with Jameson, he established the Edin- 
burgh Philosophical Journal. He afterwards began the Edinburgh Journal of Sci- 
ence, of which 16 vols, were issued. He edited the whole of the Edinburgh Ency- 
clopsedia, 1808-1829, and wrote many of its articles. He contributed also to the En- 
cyclopgedia Britaniiica, and to the North British Review. His papers in the Transac- 
tions of various learned societies are very numerous. 

Of his separate Avorks, of a more popular character, the following are the chief: 
Letters on Natural Magic; More Worlds than One, the Creed of the Philosopher and 
the Hope of the Christian ; Lives of Sir Isaac Newton, Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and 
Kepler. Among the Avorks more strictly scientific are A Treatise on Optics ; A Trea- 
tise on the Kaleidoscope, etc. 

It is remarked of Brewster's style, that while in his youth it was severe and almost 
cold, confining itself to rigid scientific statement, it became in his later days warm 
and glowing, giving free scope to the imagination and the fancy. " In the earlier 
compositions of Sir David, always severe in style and sternly scientific in form, there 
is comparatively little indication of that rich flow of fancy and imagination, and that 
fertility of happy illustration, which his later writings exhibit. As in the far West, 
his year of life enjoys an ' Indian summer,' greatly richer and more gorgeous in its 
scenery than any of the seasons that have gone before." — Hugh Millpr. " There is 
some natural tendency in the fire of genius to burn more brightly, or to blaze more 
fiercely, in the evening than in the morning of human life." — Mackintosh. 

Faraday. 

Michael Faraday F. E. S., 1791-1867, was pre-eminent in his 
day as a chemist. 

Faraday was the son of a blacksmith, and apprenticed to a bookbinder. His early 
education was very limited, but he had from the first a strong bias towards chemical 
science. Having an opportunity to attend the last four lectures of Sir Humphry 
Davy, he took notes and wrote out a sketch of the lectures, and sent it to Sir Hum- 
phry. Sir Humphry was so struck with the character of these notes that he recom- 
mended the appointment of young Faraday as an assistant in the laboratory of the 
Royal Institution. From that time Faraday devoted himself entirely to chemical 
research, and for many years before his death he was the most eminent authority in 
the world on that subject. His researches and discoveries were published in the 
Pliilosophical Transactions, and have been republished in 3 vols., as Experimental 
Researches in Chemistry. For the last forty years of his life, he delivered annual Lec- 
tures on Chemistry at the Royal Institution. These lectures were celebrated, not only 



ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE. 557 

for their eminent scientific character, but for the extraordinarj' fascinations of style 
which held the auditors spell-bound. One of his must poj^ular publications was 
Chemistry of a Candle, a Course of Six Lectures. 



Whewell. 

William Whewell, D. D., 1795-1866, distinguished himself as a 
writer on a great variety of subjects, though he was mainly known by 
his writings on the natural sciences. 

Whewell was educated at Cambridge, where he was successively Fellow, Professor, 
and Vice-Chancellor. He was a man of the most extraordinarily diversified attain-- 
ments. No subject seemed to be too recondite to be beyond his reach. Many stories 
are still current in Cambridge concerning his ready information on every subject 
that could possibly be brought up in conversation. To him was applied the saying 
that science was his forte and omniscience his foible. It must be added, however, that 
he was not always loath to display his knowledge. At the same time he was in no 
sense superficial. It may be said of him that he never left a subject without getting 
clear and accurate Ideas upon it. 

Whewell's works correspond to his attainments In their variety and power. While 
Tutor and FelloM', he published several mathematical text-books, prominent among 
which is his Dynamics. The most widely known of his works are : Astronomy and 
General Physics considered in Reference to Natural Philosophy ; the History of the 
Inductive Sciences; The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences; The Elements of Mo- 
rarlity ; The Plurality of Worlds ; History of Moral Philosophy in England. 

Whewell was one of the few men who are equally at home in the exact and the 
historical sciences, and able to do both classes justice without allowing the one to 
override the other. Hence the great value and the success of his History of the In- 
ductive Sciences. Notwithstanding its errors and its occasionally illiberal spirit, it 
is, together with the Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, a wonderful effort to co- 
ordinate the scattered and even hostile departments of human knowledge. Whewell 
is also the author of a great number of scattered pamphlets and scientific papers of 
decided value. Nor was he insensible to the claims of belles-lettres, as is shown by 
his translation of Goethe's Herman and Dorothea, and Auerbach's Professor's Wife, 
and his general fondness for German literature and philosophy. 

Babbage. 

Charles Babbage, 1790-1871, was chiefly distinguished as a 
mathematician. 

Babbage was a graduate of Cambridge University, and for eleven years professor in 
the same. His j^ublications are exceedingly numerous, and, though nearly all math- 
ematical, take a wide range through almost every department both of pure and applied 
mathematics. The whole number of his separate publications is forty-seven, many of 
them largevolumes. A large proportion of these are applications of mathematical truths 
and formulcTe to machinery, for the purpose of facilitating the arts of practical life. 

One of Babbage's works, which occuijied him for many 3'ears, and on which, by the 
aid of the Government, $85,000 was expended, was his famous CalcuUiting Machine. 
The Government having withdrawn its patronage, the ingenious apparatus was 
dropped. 

47^ 



558 TEJi-:N'YSOX AXD HIS COXTEMPORARIES. 

Of his "works not purely scientific, the following may be named : Sketches of the 
Philosophic Characters of Dr. WoUaston and Sir Humphry Davy ; The Proportion of 
Births of the Two Sexes ; Economy of Manufactures and Machinery ; The Exposition 
of 1851, or Tiews of the Industry, Science, and Government of England; and The 
Ninth Bridgewater Treatise. The last named especially is the one by which he is 
most known to the generality of readers. In it he discusses particularly the subject 
of Miracles. In 1864:, he published an autobiography, a large Svo, under the title of 
Passages from the Life of a Philosopher. At the close, he gives a list of eighty detached 
papers which he contributed to different scientific journals. 

Mrs. Somerville. 

Mrs. Mary Somerville, 1780 , a daughter of Admiral Fair- 
fax, stands at the head of female devotees to science. 

She was elected a member of several societies in England and elsewhere, and hon- 
ored Avith a pension for her services to science. Her four great works are : Mechan- 
ism of the Heavens, an abridgment of La Place, but by no means slavishly following 
the great Frenchman ; On the Connection of the Physical Sciences, an admirable 
manual, which has gone through numerous editions; Physical Geography, which is 
scarcely less popular; and On Molecular and Microscopic Science, published in 1SG9, 
when the author must have been nearly ninety years of age. There is a disagreement 
among authorities, however, as to the jear of her birth, some fixing it at 17S0, and 
others at about 1790. In any case, Mrs. Somerville's prolonged activity is remarkable. 

Darwin. 

Charles Dartvix, F. E. S., 1809 , the grandson of the poet 

and naturalist Erasmus Darwin, is himself one of the most eminent 
naturalists of the dav. 

Mr. Darwin accompanied the royal Exploring Expedition of Her Majesty's ship the 
Beagle, in 1831-1836, and published thereafter his first work. Voyage of a Xaturahst 
Round the World. It was well received in all quarters, both for the freshness of its 
information and the rare beauty and skill of the descriptions. " The author is a first- 
nite landscape painter with the pen, and the dreariest solitudes are made to teem with 
interest." — London Quarterly. He edited also the Zoology of the Expedition. An- 
other work which gained him high reputation as a naturalist was a Monograph of the 
Family Cirripedia, including the Barnacle. Other works have followed, which have 
been read with avidity, not merely by naturalists and scientific men, but by that far 
wider intellectual class who are interested in the higher generalizations of the sci- 
ences. Mr. Darwin has a singular facility in expressing his ideas in language easily 
understood and in disposing his matter for artistic effect. 

His latest works are : The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication ; 
The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection ; The Descent of Man. His sci- 
entific opinions, as contained in the works last named,have met withemphaticdissent. 
But all critics, both friends and foes, have admired the clearness and beauty of his 
style, and the wonderful variety and extent of his knowledge. 

Thomas Hexry Huxley, F. E. S., 1825 , Professor of Natu- 
ral History in the Eojal School of Mines, London, has attained an 



ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIEIS'CE. 559 

eminence as a naturalist almost, if not quite, equal to that of Mr. 
Darwin, and he belongs to the same school of opinion. 

Professor Huxley's contributions to natural science have been numerous and valu- 
able. Among those of a recent and comparatively popular character are Man's Place 
in Nature, Lectures on Comparative Anatomy, Lessons on Elementary Physiology. 

Owen. 

KicHABD Owen, D. C. L., 1804 , is the most eminent compara- 
tive anatomist of his age. 

Professor Owen is a native of England. He studied medicine at the University of Ed- 
inburgh. He has occupied several professional positions, succeeding Sir Charles Bell 
in the Royal College of Surgeons, and hn is now Director of the Natural History De- 
partment of the British Museum. His ^^Titten contributions to science are immense. 
Those of his works which are of most general interest are : Histoiy of British Fossil 
Mammals and Birds ; On the Archetype and Homologies of the Yertebrate Skeleton 
Parthenogenesis ; The Anatomy of the Yertebrates. Professor Owen is an opponent 
of Darwinism, defending the mutability of species by virtue of inherent tendencies, 
and not by change of external circumstances. His works, even to the lay reader, are 
fascinating through their vigor and clearness of style. 

Eey. John Geokge Wood, 1827 , is an accomplished natu- 
ralist, 

Mr. Wood was born in London, and educated at Oxford, where he took his M. A. in 
1851. He has written some charming works on natural history : Bees, their Habits 
and Management ; Sketches and Anecdotes of Animal Life ; The Common Objects of 
the Sea-Shore ; My Feathered Friends ; Illustrations of Natural History, 3 vols. ; 
Boy's Own Book of Natural History; Athletic Sports and Recreations for Boys; Nat- 
ural History Picture-Book for Children.; Common Objects of the Microscope: Ghmpses 
into Petland ; Our Garden Friends and Foes; Homes without Hands; Fresh and Salt 
Water Aquariums; Bible Animals; Old and New Testament History in Simple Lan- 
guage, etc., etc. 

Chahles AVateeton, 1782-1865, "was an enterprising traveller and 
naturalist. 

Mr. Waterton was born at Walton Hall, in Yorkshire. He was the head of an an- 
cient Catholic family which traces its lineage on one side to Sir Thomas More, and on 
the other side to the time of the Norman Conquest. Mr. Waterton lived to a green 
old age, maintaining both physical and intellectual vigor to the very day of his death, 
in his eighty-third year. His publications are Wanderings in South America and the 
North-West of the United States, containing observations on natural history, with 
directions for the i)reservation of birds, etc.; Essays on Natural History, with an 
Autobiography of the Author ; Ornithological Letter to William Swainson. 

Peter Mark Roget, 1779-1869, of French, or rather of Genevese extraction, was 
ediicated at Edinburgh, and held several medical and professional appointments. He 
published one or two scientific works, On Animal and Vegetable Physiology, on Elec- 



560 TEIs^NYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

tricity, Galvanism, etc. To the reader and student of English, however, Roget is 
known exclusively through his Thesaurus of English Words. This valuable work, 
intended to facilitate composition by classifying ideas and their corresponding expres- 
sions, has passed through numerous editions, and now forms an indispensable manual 
in every literary workshop. 

Philip Henry Gosse, F. R. S., 1810 , was born at Worcester. He has resided 

one year in Alabama, three years in Lower Canada, and eight in Newfoundland. IJe 
is a scientific naturalist, and has contributed largely by his writings to make the 
study of natural science pojiular in families and schools. The following are his prin- 
cipal publications: The Canadian Naturalist; Birds of Jamaica; A Naturalist's So- 
journ, in Jamaica; Natural History of Birds, Mammals, Reptiles, and Fishes; Ocean 
Described ; British Ornithology; Rivers of the Bible ; History of the Jews; Assyria; 
Text-Book of Zoology for Schools; A Naturalist's Rambles on the Devonshire Coast; 
The Aquarium, an Unveiling of the Wonders of the Deep ; A Handbook of the Marine 
Aquarium ; Manual of Marine Zoology ; Tenby, a Seaside Holiday ; Omphalos, an 
Attempt to untie the Geological Knot; History of British Sea- Anemones ; Evenings 
at the Microscope, etc. 

LyelL 

Sir Charles Lyell, 1797 , is one of the most eminent geol- 
ogists of the century. 

Sir Charles studied at Oxford, for the law, but soon abandoned that profession for 
the science with which his name is indissolubly connected. He was at one time Pro- 
fessor of Geology in King's College, London, and has been twice elected President of 
the Geological Society. 

His chief works are: Principles of Geology, 1830-2; Elements of Geology, 1838; 
Travels in North America, 1845; A Second Visit to the United States, 1849; The An- 
tiquity of Man, 1863. Lyell is, in the strictest sense of the term, a scientific inquirer; 
his method and his aim ai-e purely scientific. At the same time, by reason of his 
pleasing style and clear statement, he has been the chief agent in impressing the 
claims of the science upon the attention of the reading public. His earliest work 
and his latest — The Principles of Geology and The Antiquity of Man — mark, each 
of them, a new era in science. The latter, especially, has placed the department of 
anthropology upon an entirely new footing. Lyell's two volumes of travels are 
chiefly taken up with scientific details, but are also rich in shrewd and just obser- 
vations upon the society and institutions of the country whose geological features he 
is exploring. 

Tyndall. 

John Tyndall, 1820 , is one of the most eminent and best 

known scientists of the present day. 

Tyndall has occupied for a number of years the chair of Natural Philosophy in the 
Government School of Mines. In addition to his labors as an instructor and an in- 
vestigator, he has published several popular works on science which have spread his 
name wherever the English language is spoken, and have been translated into many 
continental languages. His special contributions to the Royal Society and the Philo- 
sophical Transactions are numerous and extremely valuable. 

Tyndall is the author of two interesting M'orks on Switzerland, entitled The Glaciers 



ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE. 561 

of the Alps, and Mountaineering in 1861, in which brilliant description of hazardous 
ascensions is skilfully blended with scientific information. His best known works, 
however, are on Heat as a Mode of Motion, and on Sound. These can scarcely be 
called popular, unless by reason of the vigor and clearness of their style, as they con- 
tain some of the most important discoveries and theories in physics that have been 
made in modern times. Tyudall belongs to that growing class of investigators — 
Huxley is another example — who unite the greatest originality and accuracy of re- 
search with the happiest style of composition. His monograph on Heat may be set 
down as marking a new epoch in that department. 

James D. Forbes, F. B. S., 1809 , has made a special study of 

the glacial formations of the Alps, and has published some volumes of 
explorations, which are as attractive as a romance. 

The following are some of his works : Travels through the Alps ; Norway and its 
Glaciers. The work on the Alps "abounds with daring and hazardous adventures, 
contains notices of occasional catastrophies that have befallen less fortunate explor- 
ers, presents interesting discoveries with new deductions, and is clothed in a style 
and diction entirely in keeping with the beauty and grandeur of the subject." — Silli- 
marCs Journal. Prof. Forbes was born at Calvinton, near Edinburgh. He was edu- 
cated at the University of Edinburgh, and was Professor of Natural Philosophy there 
from 1833 to 1860. He then became Principal of St. Salvator's and St. Leonard's Col- 
lege, St. Andrew's. 

Thomas Southwood Smith, M. D., 1788-1861, a celebrated London physician, was 
born in Somersetshire, and studied medicine in the University of Edinburgh. He was 
appointed Physician to the London Fever Hospital in 1825, and for a quarter of a cen- 
tury took a prominent part in the sanitary measures of the metropolis, and in pro- 
curing legislation in regard to the public health. He was one of the founders of the 
Westminster Review, and by his vigorous articles in this review broke up many estab- 
lished abuses. He was chiefly instrumental in ruining the business of the " resurrec- 
tion men." His separate publications were : The Use of the Dead to the Living; Dis- 
course on the Development of the Principles of the Human Mind ; Illustrations of the 
Divine Government. His utilitarian notions were carried to an extreme, as may be 
judged from the following instance : " I became acquainted with Dr. Southwood Smith. 
On visiting him, we saw an object which I have often heard celebrated, and had thought 
would be revolting, but found, on the contrary, an agreeable sight; this is the skele- 
ton of Jeremy Bentham. It was at Bentham's request that the skeleton, dressed in 
the same dress he habitually wore, stuffed out to an exact resemblance of life, and with 
a portrait-mask in wax, — the best I ever saw, — sits there as assistant to Dr. Smith in 
the entertainment of his guests, and companion of his studies. The figure leans a little 
forward, resting the hands on a stout stick which Bentham always carried, and had 
named ' Dapple.' The attitude is quite easy, the expression on the whole mild, win- 
ning, yet highly individual." — Margaret Fuller D' Ossoli. 

Daniel Wilson, LL. D., 1816 , has attained great distinction 

as an ethnologist. 

Dr. "Wilson has been for many years Professor of History and English Literature in 
University College, Toronto, Canada. His works on the early history ot the Western 
i-aces are among the most valuable contributions to that department of literature. Tho 

2L 



562 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

following are the chief: Pre-historic Man, or Researches into the Origin of Civiliza- 
tion in the Old World and the New, 2 vols., 8vo; Archaeology and Pre-historic Annals 
of Scotland ; Memorials of Edinbuigh in the Olden Times, 2 vols., 4to ; Oliver Cromwell 
and the Protectorate ; Chatterton, a Biographical Study. — George Wilson, M. D., 
LL. D., 181S-1S59, brother of the ethnologist, IJauiel Wilson, and highly distinguished 
as a chemist. He was born in Edinburgh, and studied chemistry in that city and in 
London. He held several important positions, and for the last few years of his life 
was Regius Professor of Technology in the University of Edinburgh. He published 
Chemistry, a text-book; A Life of Cavendish; A Life of John Reid, the Professor of 
Medicine in St. Andrew's ; A Memoir of Professor Forbes ; Electricity and the Electric 
Telegraph ; Researches on Color-Blindness ; Tlie Progress of the Telegraph; The Five 
Gateways of Knowledge (the eye, ear, nose, tongue, hand) ; Religio Medici, a collection 
of Religious Essays; Counsels of an Invalid; Letters on Religious Subjects. 

Young the Egyptologist. 

Thomas Young, 1773-1829, was one of the most striking characters 
of the present century, — remarkable alike for the originality of his 
researches and investigations, and the variety of his talents. 

Young was a precocious child, having studied and mastered, in his fourteenth year, 
Creek, Latin, French^ Italian, Hebrew, Persian, Arabic, and no little mathematics. 
In 1792 he began the study of medicine, first in London and then in Edinburgh. 
From Edinburgh he went to Gottingen, where he took his degree. Not only was he 
a dihgent student, but a conspicuous devotee of amusements, excelling in dancing, 
music, and horsemanship. He returned to England in 1793. To qualify himself for 
membership in the College of Physicians, Young entered Cambridge, and took his 
degree in 1799. He practised his profession for a number of years, was Professor of 
Natural Philosophy in the Royal Institution, and conducted the Nautical Almanac. 

While professor in the Royal Institution, Young published a Syllabus of Lectures on 
Natural and Experimental.Philosophy, in which he made the first announcement of 
his theory on the Interference of Light. This remarkable discovery was much at- 
tacked at the time, but is now universally accepted. It was the most general discov- 
ery in optics that had been made since the daj's of Newton, and decided the reception 
of the undulatory theory. He also published several medical works or treatises, none 
of which, however, are distinguished for originality. 

In 181-1, Young first made known his conjectural reading of the Rosetta stone. This 
he foUoM-ed up with one or two other articles, until there appeared, in 1819, his cele- 
brated article in the Encyclopsedia Britannica, which was the first really successful 
attempt at reading the great Egyptian riddle. There has been much dispute upon 
the relative merits of Young and ChampoUion to the titleof discoverer of the key to the 
hieroglyphic alpliabet. It is inipossible, of course, for any one except a professed 
Egyptologist, to speak confidently on such an abstruse matter. The general opinion 
seems to be that Young was the first to make certain suggestions, — namely, that 
some of the hieroglyphic characters represented sounds, — and that ChampoUion caught 
up these suggestions and developed them with wonderful acuteness and system. 

Young worked with great enthusiasm upon his Egyptian investigations until his 
death, and soon after his death his Rudiments of an Egyptian Dictionary in the 
Ancient Enchorial Characters was published. He also published during his lifetime 
several scientific treatises, and contributed a great number of papers to the Encyclo- 
paedia Britannica, to the leading reviews, and to various scientific bodies. A selection 
of his Miscellaneous Works was published in 3 vols, in 1855. 



ON PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE. 563 

Young appears to have been a man of almost infinite capacities. He had more than 
tlie ordinary proficiency in modern European and oriental languages, in botany and 
physiology, besides making two of the most striking discoveries in tvro departments 
of research the most widely apart. He was, in short, one of those rare phenomena 
that disturb from time to time the speculations of theorists upon the limited range 
of the human intellect. 

Wilkinson. 

Sir John Gardner Wilkinson, 1798 , educated at Harrow 

and at Oxford, is well known as the author of numerous works on 
Egyptology. 

Conspicuous among the works of Wilkinson is his Manners and Customs of the An- 
cient Egyptians, published in 18-37. This work may be said to have createda new era in 
the popular knowledge of Egypt, and given the impetus to such subsequent labors as 
those of Layard, Rawlinson, etc. It described the social life of the ancient Egyptians 
as revealed by the remains of tlieir painting, sculpture, and inscriptions. It has since 
been recast into an abridged form, entitled A Popular Account of the Ancient Egyp- 
tians, which includes recent discoveries down to 1853. A similar work is The Egyp- 
tians in the Time of the Pharaohs. His treatise On Color and the Necessity for a Gen- 
eral Diffusion of Taste is a valuable, practical work. 

Besides the works already mentioned, Wilkinson is the author of others of a more 
strictly archaeological character. Among them are the Materia Hieroglyphica, the 
Architecture of Ancient Egypt, and the Fragments of the Hieratic Papyrus at Turin. 
Of a more popular turn, again, are his Handbook of Modern Egypt and Thebes, and 
his Dalmatia and Montenegro. 

Wilkinson is a thorough scholar in whatever he undertakes, and all his works are 
full of valuable information, skilfully presented and suggesting reflection. 

Hayman \A/ilson. 

Horace Hayman Wilson, 1786-1860, a native of London, and a 
servant of the East India Company, made himself conspicuous by his 
attainments in Sanscrit. 

In 1832, Wilson was appointed Professor of Sanscrit at Oxford, and retained that po- 
sition until his death. Wilson conies next, in point of time, to Sir William Jones 
and Sir Charles Wilkins, and surpasses them both in the extent and permanent value 
of his labors. His principal works are A Sanscrit-English Dictionary, {of which anew 
edition, by Goldstiicker, still unfinished, is in course of publication in Germany,) Hin- 
doo Theatre (selections from Sanscrit Dramatists), a translation of the Vishnu Purana 
(system of Hindoo Mythology), History of British India from 1805-1835, a translation 
of the Rig-Yeda Sanhita (the oldest record of the Sanscrit language and Aryan my- 
thology), and a Glossary of Judicial and Revenue Words, etc., in the various languages 
and dialects of British India. 

Wilson superintended also the English translation of Bopp's Comparative Grammar, 
edited numerous Sanscrit texts, and contributed many papers to the Asiatic Researches, 
the Quarterly Oriental, Transactions of the Roj'al Asiatic Society, and other societies. 
A collective edition of his works is now in coui'se of publication by Triibner & Co. 

Wilson was also celebrated for his musical skill and histrionic powei"S. His entire 



564 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

life was passed in the most unceasing and profitable activitj', and he has left behind 
him a scholarly record second to none in his native country. 

Monies, Williams, 1819 , is one of the leading Sanscrit schol- 
ars of England. 

Prof. Williams Avas born at Bombay, and was educated at King's College, at Hailey- 
bury, and at Oxford. He was Professor of Oriental studies at Cheltenham, and since 
1S60 Professor of fefanscrit at Oxford. Prof. Williams's works are all upon subjects di- 
rectly connected with his chosen line of study. They are an Elementary Grammar 
of Sanscrit, a translation of Kalidasa's Vikramoroasi and Sakuntala, an English-San- 
scrit Dictionary, the Rudiments of Hindustani, a Practical Hindustani Grammar, a 
Lecture on the Study of Sanscrit in Relation to Missionary Work in India, a series 
of Lectures on Indian Epic Poetry, a translation of the story of Nala, etc. Professor 
Williams has been engaged for a number of years upon a Sanscrit-English Dictionary, 
to be published at Oxford. He can scarcely be considered as fully the equal of his 
rival, Max Miiller, either in a special knowledge of Sanscrit or in general philological 
attainments. 



V. HISTORY, BIOQRAPHY, ANTIQUITIES, ETC. 

Maeaulay. 

Thomas Babington Maeaulay, 1800-1859, was in his day 
the most brilliant living writer in England, in matters of 
historical criticism. He excelled, indeed, in almost every 
style of writing, but it was on questions of history, and es- 
pecially on those involving political issues, that his suprem- 
acy was most complete. 

Maeaulay was a native of England, but of Scotch descent. His 
father was Zachaiy Maeaulay, an eminent merchant and philanthro- 
pist, and his grandfather was the Rev. John Maeaulay, a Presbyterian 
minister in the Scottish Highlands, descended from a clan in the most 
remote of the Hebrides. His mother was of a Quaker family, the 
daughter of a bookseller of Bristol. His home education was thor- 
oughly religious. He entered the University of Cambridge at the age 
of eighteen, and greatly distinguished himself while there by the 
thoroughness of his scholarship. He twice carried off the prize, the 
Chancellor's Medal, for English verse. University honors fell thick 
about his path, but he left them behind and applied himself to the 
study of the law. 

While still a law student, he published two of his most remarkable productions, 
The Battle of Ivry, at the age of twenty-four, and the Essay on Milton, at the age of 
twenty-five. Either of these was alone suflQcieut to mark him as a man of the first 



665 

order of genius. The Essay on Milton was followed from time to time by similar 
brilliant articles in the Edinburgh Review. 

In 1830, he entered Parliament, and there by his eloquence in debate rivalled the 
fame which he had already acquired as a poet and an essayist. His principal speeches 
were upon the Reform Bill, 18.30-32, and upon the affairs of the East India Companj% 
1833. On the latter s.ubject, especially, he displayed so much knowledge and ability 
that he was made a minister of the Snpreme Council for India, and put at the head 
of the Commission to prepare a new code of laws for the Indian empire. He sojoiumed 
in India for this purpose from 1835 to 1838, and while there acquired that intimate 
knowledge of the country which appears with such wonderful effect in his articles on 
Clive and Warren Hastings. 

On returning to England, he re-entered Parliament in 183^, as a member from Ed- 
inburgh, and was made Secretary at War in the Melbourne ministry. 

During this period of political activity, he produced The Lays of Ancient Rome, 
which were printed in 1812. 

Eeing defeated in an election for Parliament, which took place in 1847, he deter- 
mined henceforth to devote himself exclusively to. literature, and he began the com- 
position of the great historical work, for which all his previous life and writings 
seemed to be a sort of special preparation. This was intended to be A History uf 
England, from the Accession of James II. down to a Time within the Memory of 
Persons Still Living. The first two volumes appeared at the close of 1818. Tolumes 
three and four appeared seven years later, in 1855 ; and a fragment of another volume 
was published after his death, the whole coming down only to the death of V>'illiam 
III., 1702. 

Macaulay was chosen, in lSi9, Lord Rector of the University of Glasgow, a mere 
oflBce of honor, not requiring residence ; he was raised to the Peerage, under the title 
of Baron Macaulay, in 1857 ; he died suddenly of an affection of the heart, in 1S59. 

Macaulay was great in everything which he undertook. He was among the first 
in the list of great parliamentary orators, though after the order of Burke rather 
than that of Fox ; he is equally among the first in the roll of great poets ; while, as 
an essayist, and a painter of historical scenes and personages, he is without a peer. 

The sale of his works, particularly of his History, has been enormous. His Essays, 
as they appeared from time to time in the Edinburgh Review, were received with the 
same sort of excitement which, in the earlj- part of the century, used to await the 
appearance of a new fiction by Scott, or a new poem by Byron. His History of 
England rivalled the most sensational novel in the eagerness with which it was pur- 
chased and read. More than sixty thousand copies of the Essays, in 5 vols., were pub- 
lished in Philadelphia alone, within the first five years. The aggregate sale of the 
third and fourth volumes of his History, within the first four Aveeks of their publi- 
cation, was over one hundred and fifty thousand copies. 

" Much as these very eminent men [Jeffrey, Mackintosh, and Sydney Smith] differ 
from each other, Mr. Macaulay is, perhaps, still more clearly distinguished from either. 
Both his turn of mind and style of writing are peculiar, and exhibit a combination 
rarely if ever before witnessed in English, or even in modern literature. Unlike 
Lord Jeffrey, he is deeply learned in ancient and modern lore : his mind is richly 
stored with the poetry and history both of classical and continental literature. Unlike 
Mackintosh, he is eminently dramatic and pictorial ; he alternately speaks poetry to 
the soul and pictures to the eye. Unlike Sydney Smith, he has omitted subjects of 
party contention and passing interest, and grappled with the great questions, the im- 
mortal names, which will forever attract the interest and command the attention of 
man. Milton, Bacon. Machiavelli, first awakened his discriminating and critical taste ; 
Clive, Warren Hastings, Frederick the Great, called forth his dramatic and historic 

48 



566 TENNYSON AND HIS CONT E MPOR AEIE S . 

powers. He has treated of the Reformation and the Catholic reaction, in his review 
of Kaulie; of the splendid despotism of the Popedom in that of Ilildebnind ; of the 
French Revolution in that of Barere. There is no danger of his essays being forgot- 
ten, like many of those of Addison ; nor of pompous uniformity of style being com- 
plained of, as in most of those of Johnson. His learning is prodigious; and perhaps 
the chief defects of his composition arise from the exuberant riches of the stores from 
■which they are drawn. When warmed in his subject, he is thoroughly in earnest, and 
his hiuguage, in consequence, goes direct to the heart. In many of his writings — 
and especially the first volume of his history, and his essay on the Reformation — 
there are reflections, equally just and original, which never have been surpassed in 
the philosoi^hy of history. That he is imbued with the soul of poetry need be told to 
none who have read his Battle of the Lake Regillus ; that he is a great biographer 
will be disputed by none who are acquainted with the splendid biographies of Clive 
and Hastings, by much the finest productions of the kind in the English language." 
— Sir Archibald Alison. 

Grote. 

George Grote, 1794-1871, the historian of Greece, was the finest 
specimen in modern times of a man of business wlio was at the same 
time in the foremost rank as a scholar and a man of letters. 

Something of Mr. -G rote's success in the latter, doubtless, is due to the fact that he 
carried his business liabits and solid business sense into the investigation of subjects 
usually monopolized by mere scholars, who have no practical experience of affairs. 

He Avas educated at the Charter-House School, and at the age of sixteen entered as 
a clerk in the banking-house established by his grandfather, and in which he himself 
afterwards became a partner. He spent his leisure hours, as a clerk, in patient study, 
and having early formed the purpose of writing the work which has made him fa- 
mous, set about the preparation for it with a degree of courage and deliberation that 
border upon the marvellous. Without a University training, he bent himself to the 
task of writing the most difficult of all histories, The History of Greece. Not being 
a classical scholar, he applied himself to master not only the Greek language, but 
whatever related to Greek life, history, literature, and philosophy. 

As clerk, and afterwards as partner in the great banking-house of " Grote and Pres- 
cott," he learned sagacity in his dealings with men ; and insensibly his knowledge, 
thus gained, became a knowledge of human nature which shed light on the Greek 
studies he persistently followed. His History of Greece was begun in 1823 ; but the 
ideas which directed it, and gave it originality, were due to his sympathy with the 
semi-democratic outbreak of the English Reform movement, in 1830 and 1831. Grote 
threw himself into public life, and, for three successive Paiiiaments, appeared as the 
philosophic champion of Radical reform. In 1841, he retired from Parliament, but he 
had learned the great secret revealed in the struggle of political factions. Hence the 
peculiar wortli, originality, and reality of his History of Greece. Even the tory crit- 
ics said: "This historian is the only undoubted scholar who knows something more 
than other scholars know. He has, unfortunately, as a radical, mingled with affairs. 
He interprets the Greek democracy because he knows something of the democracy 
of our time. We accept him, as an historian of Greece, provided he shows no igno- 
rance of the slightest point affecting the most delicate scholarship in regard to Greek 
geography, antiquities, history, and literature." Grote stood this test triumphantly. 
Hence his great fame. He was an English banker and politician ; at the same time 
he was a marvel of Greek scholarship. 

The History was completed in 1856, and filled 12 vols., Svo. 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 567 

Then followed, after many years, his important work on Plato, a masterpiece of re- 
search, analysis, and scholarship. Here the genius of the man of business was, for 
the first time in the history of speculation, bi'ought to bear on the noblest and highest 
of transcendental philosophers. The work was iu 3 vols., and was entitled Plato and 
the Other Companions of Socrates. 

But all scholars looked to Grote as the most competent of Englishmen to deal 
with Aristotle. It was understood that he was engaged, up to the time of his death, 
in an elaborate exposition of the works of that philosopher, whose genius had so 
many points of contact and sympathy with his own. Had he lived three years longer, 
we have no doubt that he would have completed his task, — a task which would have 
summed up the results of his literary life, devoted for fifty years to the illustration 
and interpretation of the history, literature, and philosophy of Greece. 

But what we specially desire to emphasize, in this tribute to Grote, is the fact that 
he was a business man throughout his career, competent to deal, in business matters, 
with the keenest banker or merchant of his time. The man who best understood 
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle was the man who could compete with Rothschild in 
bidding for a loan, and stand up against Peel or Palmerston in the House of Com- 
mons. — Every Saturday (altered and abridged). 

Froude. 

James Anthoky Froude, 1818 , has placed himself in the 

rank of distinguished historians. 

Mr. Froude is a graduate and Fellow of Oxford. His principal work, A History of 
England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth, in 12 vols., 8vo, is a mon- 
ument at once of historical research and of literary culture. Besides this great work, 
Mr. Froude has published The Shadows of the Clouds, a Novel ; The Nemesis of Faith ; 
Short Studies on Great Studies ; and Calvinism, an Address delivered at St. Andrew's 
University. 

" The peculiar merit of Mr. Froude's work is its wealth of unpublished manu- 
scripts; and the reign of Elizabeth is remarkably illustrated by the correspondence 
of the Spanish ambassadors and other agents of the Court of Simancas. The extra- 
ordinary interest of such illustrations is apparent in every page of these volumes; 
they give novelty to the narrative and variety to the well-known incidents of the 
time; and they bring in aid of historical evidence the contemporary opinions of so- 
ciety upon current events." — Edinburgh Review. 

Merivale. 

Kev. Charles Merivale, 1808 , Fellow of Cambridge, has 

published an elaborate History of the Komans. 

The object of this work, which is in 7 vols., 8vo, is to bridge over the interval be- 
tween the point at which Arnold was interrupted, and that at which Gibbon began. 
Mr. Merivale has told this part of the Roman story in a way that leaves little to bo 
desired. His work is not a compilation, but an original history, the fruit of careful 
and prolonged investigation. If it does not possess the splendor of Gibbon, or the 
vigorous grasp of Arnold, it is yet admirable as a work of art, and worthy to hold a 
place between these two great masters, and to form with them the continuous story of 
Roman affairs. Mr. Merivale has published also The Conversion of the Roman Em- 
pire, The Conversion of the Northern Nations, and two volumes of Sermons. 



568 TENKYSON AND HIS CO XTE MPOE A RI ES . 

Herman Merttale, 1805 , a brother of the preceding, and Professor of Political 

Economy at Oxford, has written Lectures on Colonization and the Colonies, and com- 
pleted the Memoirs of Sir Philip Francis, begun by Joseph Parker. 

Milman. 

Henky Hart Milman, 1791-1868 ; distinguished himself in va- 
rious walks of authorship, but chiefly as an historian. 

Milman was a native of London. He was educated at Eton and Oxford, took orders 
in the Church of England, and was made Dean of St. Paul's in 1849. He was also, for 
a while. Professor of Poetry in Oxford. 

Dean Milman's works are both various and numerous ; the earlier ones are almost 
wholly poetical ; the later, historical. 

His poetical productions are: Fazio, a Tragedy; Samor, an Heroic Poem; The Fall 
of Jerusalem, The Martyr of Antioch, Belshazzar, and Anne Boleyn, Dramatic Poems; 
and The Apollo Belvidere. In these works. Dean Milman unquestionably displayed 
jjoetic ability, but his style is strained and overcolored. Notwithstanding the praise 
that was heaped upon them at their appearance, it may be doubted whether they still 
enjoy any notable share of popularity, or whether even Milman himself, although poet- 
ically inclined, was really a poet. It can scarcely be said of him that he has added 
any new chai-acters to the great gallery of imagination, or enriched the language with 
fresh turns of thought or powers of expression. The Dean's merits as a poet are com- 
pletely overshadowed by his services as an historian. 

Ilis chief historical works are : The History of the Jews ; the well known annotated 
edition of Gibbon's Rome; The History of Christianity from the Birth of Christ to the 
Abolition of Paganism in the Empire; and The History of Latin Christianity down 
to the Pontificate of Nicolas Y. Besides these graver labors. Dean Milman also pub- 
lished the Life and Works of Horace, an elegant edition filled with the choicest wood- 
cuts and other illustrations. 

The History of Christianity and The History of Latin Christianity are justly regarded 
as standard works. They evince great erudition and logical grasp of mind on the part 
of the historian, and are written in a spirit of Christian liberality. Of course it can- 
not be expected of them that they will satisfy all parties or denominations. Dean 
Milman is too liberal for some, too orthodox for others. Tlie subjects of which his 
volumes treat are the most obscure and the most controversial in history. The Dean 
has endeavored to pursue a just-middle course through the labyrinth, and. while 
maintaining his Protestantism, to render charity to all. The style, particularly of 
the Latin Christianity, is at times labored, 

Agnes Strickland. 

Agnes Strickland, 1806 , is entitled to an honored place in 

the gallery of distinguished historical writers. 

Miss Strickland is a daughter of Thomas Strickland, Esq., and one of a family of 
eight children, who have all shown literary ability. 

Miss Agnes Strickland began her career as an authoress by publishing several vol- 
umes of poetry, among them the Worcester Field, or the Cavalier, and Demetrius. She 
afterwards published some prose works. The Rival Crusoes, The Pilgrims of Walsing- 
ham. Tales and Stories from History, etc. 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 569 

In 1840 appeared the first volume of her really first great work, — The Queens of Eng- 
land. It made the name of Miss Strickland at once famous. Since that time she lias 
published The Queens of Scotland, and the Lives of the Bachelor Kings of England. 
In most pf these works she received much assistance from her sister Elizabeth, -svho 
refused however to have her name put on the title-page. The materials were col- 
lected by means of careful researches in the British Museum and other great public 
libraries. 

Miss Strickland's power of writing is far from equalling her industry in research. 
The style is rather poor and thin, and the statements sometimes inaccurate. She is 
not impartial in her treatment of the Stuarts and their adversaries, but is decidedly 
prejudiced. With all their defects, however, her volumes afford an agreeable reading 
for the lover of history, and contain many minutiaj of royal domestic life not to be 
found in more ambitious and more philosophical works. 

Jane. Strickland, an older sister of Agnes, has written A Family History of 
Rome. — Major Samuel Strickland, 1809-1867, a brother of Agnes and Jane, emi- 
grated to Canada. He wrote a popular work, Twenty-Seven Years in Canada "West, 
or The Experience of an Early Settler. — Susannah Strickland, another sister of Ag- 
nes, was married to John Durban Moodie, of the North British Fusileers, and went with 
her husband to Canada, where she has. since resided. Mrs. Moodie partakes of the gen- 
eral literary abilities of the family. She has written : Roughing it in the Bush, or Life in 
Canada: Life in the Clearings; Flora Lyndsay ; Mark Huddlestone ; Matrimonial Specu- 
lations; The Moncktons; Passages in an Eventful Life. — Catharine Parr Strickland, 

1805 , still another sister, was married in 1832 to Lieutenant Traill, of the Royal 

North British Fusileers, of the same regiment with Mr. Moodie, and emigrated with 
her husband to Canada to reside. Besides many juvenile productions, Mrs. Traill has 
published The Backwoods of America; Canadian Crusoes ; Ramblings in the Canadian 
Forest ; Stories of the Canadian Forest ; Lady Mary and her Nurse, or a Peep into the 
Canadian Forests ; Female Emigrants' Guide, etc. 



Rawlinson. 

George Eawli^^son, 1815 , is well known to all lovers of his- 
tory and the classics by his admirable Translation of Herodotus. 

Mr. Rawlinson studied at Oxford, and was for several years a Fellow of his college, 
and University Examiner. In the preparation of his great work on Herodotus, Raw- 
linson was assisted by his brother, Sir Henry C. Rawlinson, the Assyrian traveller, 
and by Sir John G. Wilkinson the Egyptologist. 

The ti-anslation, as a specimen of English, is not so pleasing, perhaps, as some other 
renderings of the Greek master, but it is very accurate and close, while the notes and 
essays embody the great mass of information acquired by the many recent discoveries 
of all kinds made in Assyria. Syi'ia, Egypt, and Phoenicia. This edition of Herodotus 
is undoubtedly one of the most valuable contributions made to general history during 
the present century. 

Besides his joint labors in the translation of Herodotus, Mr. Rawlinson has also 
published, in 4 vols., A History of the Five Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern 
World, namely, Chaldasa. Assyria, Babylonia, Media, and Persia, which equals in 
importance, if it does not surpass, its predecessor. 

In addition to these larger undertakings, Rawlinson has delivered a course of Bamp- 
ton Lectures on the Historical Evidences of the Truth of Scripture, and a University 
course on The Contrasts of Christianity with the Heathen and Jewish Systems. 
48* 



570 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Sir Henry Creswicke Rawlinson, 1810 , entered the East India Company's ser- 
vice, and resided for a number of years in Persia, where he succeeiled in decipliering 
many of the Cuneiform inscriptions. Sir Henry's chief litei'ary labors liave been 
associated with those of his brother George in the translation of Herodotus. He has 
published separately, however, an Outline of the History of Assyria, based upon a 
translation of the inscriptions discovered by Layard at Nineveh, and a Memorandum 
on the Publication of the Cuneiform Inscriptions. 

Palgrave. 

Sir Francis Palgrave, 1788-1861, is well known as an historian 
and archgeologist. 

Sir Francis changed his family name of Cohen to that of Palgrave, and in 1882 
he was knighted. He published many contributions to the study of early English 
history which are of great value. As a writer and investigator he made himself 
famous by his History of England in the Anglo-Saxon Period, The Rise and Progress 
of the English Commonwealth, and The History of England and Normandy. These 
works place him in the first rank of English historians. 

Napier. 

Sir William Francis Patrick I*^apier, 1785-1866, is distin- 
guished both as a military commander and as a writer. 

Sir William served with distinction in the Peninsular War, rising to the rank of 
lieutenant-colonel. In 1861 he was made lieutenant-gem^ral. 

Napier's great work is his History of the War in the Peninsula, in 6 vols., published 
in 1828-1840. Although by an English officer, it does ample justice to Napoleon's 
genius as a military commander, and is anything but favorable to the policy of the 
English ministry. It was made, on the occasion of its appearance, the object of many 
angry attacks ; the principal one was by General Sir George Murray, in the London 
Quarterly. It is needless to say that the history has survived its numerous assailants, 
and is now generally recognized as the standard work on the subject. The style is 
exceedingly graphic and dignified ; in fact, it may be regarded, in this respect, as an 
English classic. 

Besides his History of the Peninsular War, Sir William has written also a History 
of the Conquest of the Scinde by his brother. Sir Charles James Napier ; A History of 
the Administration of Scinde; an Abridgment of the History of the Peninsular Cam- 
paign; and several other short works on military matters. 

Sir Charles James Napier, 17S2-1853, was. a brother of Sir William Napier, the his- 
torian, and a cousin of Sir Charles John Napier, the admiral. Sir Charles James was 
a distinguished English general, first rising to prominence in the campaign in Spain, 
and afterwards in India, chiefly by his conquest of Scinde. He was the author of seve- 
ral works on military matters, and of an historical romance, called William the Con- 
queror. The best known books by him are Military Law, and Lights and Shadows of 
Military Life. His pamphlet on the Civil and Military Defects of the Indian Govern- 
ment, edited by his brother, was an able contribution to the cause of reform in India. 

Sir Charles John Napier, 1786-1860, was the well known admiral of the English 
fleet in the Baltic during the Russian war. He served in the British iieet against the 
United States in 1813-14, and was commander of the Portuguese fleet that defeated 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 571 

Don Miguel, in 1833. In addition to his naval services, lie is the author of several 
works : The War in Portugal between Pedro and Miguel; The War in Syria; and the 
Past and Present of the Navy. Sir Charles John's writings resemble his actions, — 
bluff, hasty, and choleric. 

Lord Mahon. 

Philip Henry, Lord Mahon, fifth Earl of Stanhope, 1805 , 

holds a high rank as an historian. 

Lord Mahon was educated at Oxford, and has held various oflBces under the Eng- 
lish Government. His principal works are: History of the War of the Succession in 
Spain ; History of England from the Peace of Utreclit to the Peace of Versailles (1717- 
1783) ; and Historical Essays, collected from the Quarterly Review. Lord Mahon was 
also co-editor, with Lord Cardwell, of the Memoirs of Sir Robert Peel, and edited a new 
edition of Lord Chesterfield's famous Letters, with explanatory notes. 

Lord Mahon Is a zealous investigator, and a clear and impai'tial writer. His History 
of England contains an able account, — the best, perhaps, yet written by one not a 
native, — of the American War of Independence. Unfortunately, however, it involved 
him in two disputes with American historians. He had charged Sparks with altering 
Washington's letters, and also with adding matter not contained in them. This charge 
■was indignantly repelled and refuted, and was subsequently withdrawn by Lord Mahon 
himself. He had also characterized the execution of Andre as a " blot" upon Wash- 
ington's career. This led to an exhaustive investigation of the entire subject by Major 
Charles Biddle of Philadelphia, who showed conclusively "that Washington had no 
alternative ; the prisoner was regularly tried before the proper tribunal, and received 
the fate which he had incurred." 

In 1862, Lord Mahon published, in four volumes, the Life of William Pitt,, an in- 
valuable contribution to English history. The first part of a still more recent work. 
The Reign of Queen Anne until the Peace of Utrecht, has appeared, and bids fair to 
rival, if not surpass, its predecessors. It is to form the connecting link between 
Macaulay's History and Mahon's previous History of England from the Peace of 
Utrecht to the Peace of Versailles. 

Vaughan — Father and Son. 

Egbert Vaughan, D.D., 1795-1868, a distinguished Independent 
pjjstor^ for many years Professor of History in University College, 
London, is among the prominent historians of the present century. 

Br. Vaughan's contributions are numerous and valuable. Among them may be sig- 
nalized The Life of Wycliffe (the second edition, published in ISl.i) ; The Memorial of 
the Stuart Familj' ; The Protectorate of Cromwell and the State of Europe during the 
Early Reign of Louis XIV. ; The Age of Great Cities ; English Non-conformity ; Ritual- 
ism in the English Church, etc- His chief work, however, is his Revolutions in Eng- 
lish History, in which he traces with great fidelity and liberality the changes that 
England has undergone in its races, its religion, and its government. This is one of 
the most important general works on English history that has appeared of late. 

Dr. Vaughan was, in addition to his other labors, the originator, and for twenty 
years the editor, of llie British Quarterly. A seb ction of his contributions to this 
periodical was made and i)ublished by him in 1849. entitled Essays on History. Phi- 
losophy, and Theology. Dr. Vaughan's style is plain, sometimes perhaps too plain, 



572 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

but it is free from meretricious ornament, and evinces such a spirit of truth and of 
patient research as renders his works extremely valuable to the independent reader 
in quest of information. 

Robert Alfred Vaughan, 1823-1857, was son of Robert Vaughan, and was educated 
at University College, London. Young Vaughan attained great distinction among tl'.e 
Independents, and was the author of a few valuable works. His untimely death was 
deeply regretted by numerous warm admirers. It appears to have been the common 
belief among his friends that, had his life been prolonged, he would have developed 
rare intellectual powers. As it is, he has left behind him only one finished work of 
lasting reputation : Hours with the Mystics, a Contribution to the History of Religious 
Opinions. An earlier volume of poems, comprising The Witch of Endor, can scarcelj' 
be pronounced extraordinary. But the Hours with the Mystics is regarded as a very 
able treatment of an extremely dlfBcult subject. After his death, a collection of liis 
Essays and Litei-ary Remains was published, together with a sketch of his Life, by 
his father, the well-known historian. The record thus given makes us feel only the 
more keenly the loss which his death has occasioned. 

Thirlwall. 

CoNNOP Thirlwall, 1797 , Bishop of St. David's, is well 

known by his History of Greece. 

Thirlwall was educated at Cambridge. He resided at the University after gradua- 
tion, and was admitted to the bai-, but finally took orders in the Church of England. 
He was made Bishop of St. David's in 1840. Bishop Thirlwall has published several 
charges, sermons, and miscellaneous religious treatises, but is chiefly known by his 
History of Greece. This appeared originally in Lardner's Cabinet EncycIopa;dia, but 
was republished, in a much enlai-ged form, in 1845. Before this, the Bishop had been 
associated with Hare in translating Niebuhr's History of Rome. 

Thirlwall's History of Greece met with immediate and general recognition. It was 
a worthy pi-edecessor of Grote's great work. Indeed, that historian admits that, had 
ThirlwalFs history appeared sooner, he himself would never have undertaken his own 
history. 

Thirlwall's style is dry, and not inviting to the general reader. But the spirit of 
the work is liberal, and in direct opposition to Mitford's aristocratic teachings. It is 
the first scientific attempt at portraying the democratic element in Greek history, 
and is based upon careful and original investigation. 

Kinglake. 

Alexander William Kinglake, 1811 , is chiefly known by 

his history of The Invasion of the Crimea. 

Kinglake is a native of Devonshire. He was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and was 
admitted to the bar in 1837. Kinglake is the author of Eothen, a collection of sketches 
of Eastern travel, which has been pronounced to be the most fascinating work of the 
kind ever written. He also accompanied the Crimean expedition, and has commenced a 
detailed account of the campaign under the title. The Invasion of the Crimea, of which 
two volumes have already appeared. Kinglake is an enthusiastic admirer of Lord 
Raglan, and his work has therefore somewhat of a partisan character. But the vivid 
and detailed description which it gives of the campaign, and its merciless exposure 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 573 

of the conduct of Louis Napoleon, in connection with its clear and vigorous style, 
place the work in the foreuion rank of contributions to special history. 

Arthur Helps, 1818 , is favorably known both as an historian 

and as a writer of miscellanies. 

Helps was graduated at Cambridge in 1835. He has produced several poems, among 
them Catherine Douglas, a Tragedy, and a number of essays, the best of wliich are 
Friends in Council, and Companions of My Solitude. His later works are almost ex- 
clusively historical, and constitute a valuable contribution to the history of Span- 
ish America. They are: The Conquerors of the New World, A History of the Spanish 
Conquest, and A Life of Columbus. Helps is a thoroughly earnest writer and a dili- 
gent investigator, but his style lacks something of the dignity and finish of the clas- 
sical historian. 

George Fixlay, 1800 , is an historian of some note. 

Finlay is a native of Scotland. He spent some years in Athens. He has written: 
Greece Under the Romans ; History of Greece from its Conquest liy the Crusaders to 
its Conquest by the Turks ; History of the Byzantine Empire ; History of the Byzan- 
tine and Greek Empire. 

JoHX Hill Burton, 1809 , has won a high reputation as an 

historian and biographer. 

Mr. Burton was born at Aberdeen, in Scotland. His father, who died early in life, 
was an officer in the British army. His mother, the daughter of an Aberdeen laird, 
gave all her children a good education. Burton studied at Marischal College, Aher- 
deen. where he took the degree of A. M. In 1831 he became an advocate at the Scot- 
tish bar. He has given much time to the cultivation of literature, and has written 
the best History of Scotland yet produced, being a large and original work. Besides 
this, he contributed to the Supplement and the later VTjlumes of the Penny Cyclopae- 
dia, chiefly on subjects connected with Scottish law; he lias done a large amount of 
scholarly labor in the way of editing the works of others, and has produced some im- 
portant original works on subjects connected with his profession. 

His principal publications are the following: Jeremy Bentham's Works, 11 vols., 
8vo, edited in conjunction with Sir John Bowi-ing; Letters of Eminent Persons ad- 
dressed to David Hume, 8vo, edited ; Life and Correspondence of David Hume, 2 vols., 
8vo; Lives of Simon, Lord Lovet and Duncan Forbes, 8vo; Nan-atives from the Crimi- 
nal Trials in Scotland, 2 vols., 8vo ; Political and Social Economy; Manual of the Law 
of Scotland, 3 vols., 8vo ; The Law of Bankruptcy, etc., in Scotland, 2 vols., 8vo; The 
History of Scotland, from Agricola's Invasion to the Revolution of 1668, 7 vols., 8vo. 
and from the Revolution to the Extinction of the Last Jacobite Insurrection, 1(368- 
1718, 2 vols., 8vo. 

William Stirling (now Sir William Stirling Maxwell), 1818- 
, has acquired celebrity as a writer on Spanish history. 

Sir William is a native of Scotland. He studied at Cambridge, and afterwards re- 
sided for some time on the continent, familiarizing himself with the language and insti- 
tutions of Spain. His chief works are : Annals of the Artists of Spain, Cloister Life of 
Charles V., Velasquez and his Works. He also edited the Memoirs of the Marquis of 



574 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Tillars at the Court of Spain from 1678 to 1682. Stirling is one of the most accom- 
plished Spanish scholars of the present day, His works are extremely interesting. 
He himself is called by Prescott " that prince of good fellows."' 

Sir Ja^ies Peioe,, 1790-1869, is known chiefly bv his Life of 
Burke. 

Prior was a native of Ireland. He served in the medical department of the Royal 
Navy. Sir James is the author of several works of decided literary value. Among 
them are his Memoirs of the Life of Burke, and several other works on Burke's Ge- 
nius, Correspondence, etc., and also his Life of Oliver Goldsmith. These two biogra- 
phies have been highly praised, — the one of Burke as the best on that subject, the 
one on Goldsmith as second only to Forster's work. Prior has also published a life 
of Edward Mai one. 

John Forstee, 1812 , a journalist and a biographical -writer 

of high standmg. 

He is a native of Newcastle. He was educated at the London University, and 
studied law. In 1834, he began writing for The Examiner, and in 1816 he became its 
chief Editor. He has contributed also to the Edinburgh Review, and to the Foreign 
Quarterly, of which latter he was for four years the Editor. 

His sejiarate publications are Historical and Biographical Essays, 2 vols. ; Walter 
Savage Landor, a Biography, 2 vols. ; Lives of the Statesmen of the Commonwealth, 
7 vols. ; Life and Adventures of Oliver Goldsmith ; A Life of Charles Dickens. 

The Lives of the Statesmen of the Commonwealth gave the author an immediate 
and high rank as a political historian. The Life of Goldsmith led to a sharp contro- 
versy with Prior, who, in his voluminous work on the same subject, had diligently 
collected all the facts from original sources. Prior seemed to think that he had a 
sort of copyright to the facts, and that it was very impertinent in Mr. Forster to take 
the facts, thus collected, and make of them a more interesting story than his own. 
Priors work Avas original, authentic, and dull. Forster"s was lively and readable. 

Samuel SjNOLES, 1816 , is well known as a biographer. 

Mr. Smiles was at one time Editor of the Leeds Times, and then secretary to the 
South-Eastern Railway. His most popular works are : The Life of George Stephen- 
son, Self-Help, and Lives of the Engineers. These have all become very popular in 
England and America, especially Self-Ilelp. In addition to these, he has published 
James Brindley and the Early Engineers, the Lives of Bolton and Watts, and the 
Huguenots in England and Ireland. Mr. Smiles is a writer who has succeeded ad- 
mirably in conveying information in a pleasing form. Mr. Smiles was born at Had- 
dington, in Scotland, and was educated for the medical profession. 

David Masson, 1823 , a Scottish critic and essayist, has at- 
tained celebrity also a.s a biographer. 

Prof. Masson was born in Aberdeen, and educated at Marischal College and at the 
University of Edinburgh. He has been from an early age a contributor to Frazer's 
Magazine, The North British and The London Quarterly Reviews. He became in 
1859 the Editor of Macmillans Magazine, and in i860 he was appointed Professor of 



HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 575 

Rhetoric and English Literature in the University of Edinburgh. He has published 
Essays, Biographical and Critical, chiefly on English Poets; British Novelists and their 
Styles; The Life and Times of Milton. The work last named is one of high excel- 
lence, — the best attempt yet made to do full justice to the gi-eat poet of the Com- 
monwealth. 

George Henry Lewes, 1817 , is known chiefly as a biog- 
rapher, 

Mr. Lewes is a native of London. He abandoned commerce and medicine for letters. 
He has contributed a great number of articles to Frazer and Blackwood and to all the 
quarterlies. His independent works are : A Life of Robespierre ; The Spanish Drama; 
Biographical Histoi-y of Philosophy ; and The Life of Goethe, besides two or three 
novels. 

Mr. Lewes is not a profound thinker or investigator, neither is he a perfect master 
of style. His works, nevertheless, are extremely valuable contributions to literature. 
The best of them is undoubtedly The Life of Goethe. This is the most satisfactory 
and readable biography of the great poet that is to be found in any language. There 
are a few mistakes and deficiencies in the work, but in the main it is a just and ample 
portraiture of Goethe. It has been severely criticized in England and America ; chiefly, 
however, by writers who know little of Goethe"s real position in literature and noth- 
ing of the condition of Germany in that age. The Biographical History of Philosophy 
is clear and animated, but somewhat superficial. Mr. Lewes's mind is itself not philo- 
sophical enough, perliaps, to do full justice to such a theme. "VYith all its defects, 
however, the work is a very practical manual for the general public. 

James Grant, 1806 , Editor of the London Morning Chronicle, is a native of 

Scotland. He has published a number of popular works, showing a fine talent for 
observation and for giving i)en-pictures of men and things. "Works: Random Recol- 
lections of the House of Lords. 2 vols. ; Ditto of the House of Commons, 2 vols. ; The 
British Senate; The Great Metropolis, 2 vols.; The Bench and the Bar, 2 vols.; 
Travels in Town, 2 vols.; Sketches in London ; The Metropolitan Pulpit, or Sketches 
of the Most Popular Preachers in London, 2 vols. The work last named is highly 
spoken of. 

"William Hepworth Dixon, 1821 , was educated for the bar, 

but has devoted himself to a literary life. 

He became Editor of the London Athenteum in 1853. His separate publications have 
been numerous. John Howard and his Prison-World of Europe ; The London Prisons ; 
William Penn, an Historical Biography, intended especially to vindicate Penn from 
the charge made by Macaulay ; Life of Admiral Blake ; The French in England, or 
Both Sides of the Question on Both Sides of the Channel ; Personal History of Lord 
Bacon; The Holy Land; The Town of London; New America; Spiritual Wives, giving 
the results of his visit to the Mormons. 

Thomas Wright. 

Thomas Wright, 1810 , is one of the most prominent anti- 
quarians and archaeologists of the day. 

Mr. AVright was educated at Cambridge. He has been since 1835 a resident of Lon- 
don. Whilst still a student at Cambridge, he published articles iu the leading Eng- 



576 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEM POE A RI ES . 

lisli magazines upon subjects connected with English antiquities. His literai-y labors 
have been immense. He took an active part iu the formation of the Camden, Percy, 
and Shakespeare societies and the British Archaeological Congress, and is Correspond- 
ing Member of the French Institute. 

Mr. Wright's works may be roughly grouped in two classes : editions of early English 
texts, and original works or treatises. The former are especially numerous. Promi- 
nent among them are Geoffrey of Monmouth's Life of Merlin, the Reliquiae Antiquae 
(in connection with Halliwell), Political Ballads of the Commonwealth, Piers Plow- 
man's Creed and Vision, The Chester Plays, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (from the 
celebrated Ilarleian MSS.), etc. This list will give only a faint idea of the immense 
extent and variety of Mr. Wright's labors as an editor. 

The more prominent of his treatises, or works of his own, are the Biographia Brit- 
annica Literaria; Essays on Subjects connected with the Literiture, Popular Super- 
stitions, and History of England during the Middle Ages ; England under the House 
of Hanover, as Illustrated by Caricatures of the Day ; Narratives of Sorcery and Magic ; 
The Celt, the Homan, and the Saxon; Dictionary of Provincial and Obsolete English ; 
A Histoi-y of Caricature, etc. 

Even this list, by no means a short one, is incomplete. It will suffice, however, to 
give an approximate idea of the authors enthusiastic industr3\ Wright may safely 
be set down for the largest share of credit in awakening and sustaining the present 
popular and also the professional study of early English. 

Benjamin Thorpe, 1808-1870, was one of the most eminent Anglo- 
Saxon scholars of England. 

Mr. Thorpe published a large number of works, all of great value in the department 
of literature to which he devoted himself. The following are some of them : Rask's 
Grammar of the Anglo-Saxon Tongue, translated ; Caedmon's Metrical Paraphrase, 
etc., with English Translation and Notes ; Anglo-Saxon Version of Apollonius of 
Tyre, with a ti-anslation and a glossary; Analecta Anglo-Saxonia, a selection, in prose 
and verse, from Anglo-Saxon authors, with a glossary ; The Holy Gospels in Anglo- 
Saxon; The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church; Ancient Laws and Institutions 
of England ; History of England under the Anglo-Saxon Kings, translated from the 
German; Northern Mythology; Yule-Tide Stories, a collection of Scandinavian tales 
and traditions ; The Anglo-Saxoa Poems of Beowulf, with a translation ; The Anglo- 
Saxon Chronicle, etc. 

Sir Fredekick Madden, 1801 , a well-known English antiquary, is Keeper of 

the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum. In this capacity Sir Fred- 
erick h;is published a number of valuable contributions to English archaeology and 
letters. His leading publications are : Havelok, the Dane; Sir Gawayne; Layamou's 
Brut ; and a translation of Silvestre's Universal Paleography. 

James Orchad Halliwell, 1820 , is a prominent British archasologist. He has 

edited a number of rare works, principally Shakesperiana. The best known are The 
Life of Shakespeare, published in 1848, and a grand edition of the works of the poet, 
in 20 vols., fol., profusely illustrated, and based upon a collation of all the early edi- 
tions and the original plays and novels from which Shakespeare derived his plots. 

Rev. Alexander Dyce, 1797-1869, was born and educated at Edinburgh. He en- 
tered the ministry of the English Church, and after 1827 resided permanently in Lon- 
don. Mr. Dyce was eminent for his accurate scholarship in old English literature. 



BIOGRAPHY, ETC. 577 

His extensive knowledge of the subject, joined to rare soundness of judgment, gave 
him remarkable success as an editor, in correcting texts which had become corrupt, 
as well as in elucidating by apt comment passages which were obscure. He edited 
most of the early dramatists, — Greene, Webster, Shirley, Beaumont and Fletcher, 
Marlow, Peele, and lastly Shakespeare. 

J. Payne Collier. 

John Payne Colliee, 1789 , has attained great celebrity as a 

Shakespeare critic and editor. 

Mr. Collier began his career as a student of law, but was drawn away from that 
profession by his love for letters, and he has zealously devoted himself to the latter 
now for nearly half a century. Besides contributions to magazines and reviews, he 
has published the following works : The Poetical Decameron, or Ten Conversations on 
English Poets and Poetry ; History of English Dramatic Poetry to the Time of Shake- 
speare ; An Edition of the Works of Shakespeare, with the Various Readings, Notes, 
a Life of the Poet, and a History of tlie Early English Stage ; Memoirs of the Princi- 
pal Actors in the Shakespeare Plays; Shakespeare's Library, a collection of the 
ancient romances, novels, legends, poems, and histories used by Shakespeare as the 
foundation of his Dramas; Extracts of the Registers of the Stationers' Company, of 
Books entered for publication, 1555-1570. These various works filled his time for a 
period equal to an ordinary lifetime. His edition of Shakespeare contains the gar- 
nered fruit of thirty years of labor. 

In 1852, when the veteran critic was reposing upon his laurels, he made a supposed 
discovery, the publication of which threw the whole Shakespeare world into commo- 
tion. He had purchased at a second-hand bookstall an old volume of Shakespeare, 
which on examination proved to be a copy of the Folio of 1632, and the margin of 
which was thickly besprinkled with emendations in manuscript. These emendations 
Mr. Collier believed from internal evidence to have been made at a very early date, 
and if so, to be of great value in determining the true text of Shakespeare. The pub- 
lication led to an exciting controversy, in which Mr. Collier got some pretty hard 
rubs. The question in regard to the value of this Annotated Folio is even yet not en- 
tirely settled. 

Other Arehasologists. 

The number of able and learned men who have devoted themselves 
to this department of literature is very large. In addition to the 
names already given, a few others will be briefly mentioned. 

William J. Thoms, 1803 , was born at Westminster. He has been Secretary of 

the Camden Society, a clerk in Printed Papers Department of the House of Lords, and 
Deputy Librarian of the House of Lords, etc. His positions and occapation have been 
such as to give him facilities for literary and antiquarian research. He has published 
A Collection of Early Prose Romances, 3 vols., 8vo ; Lays and Legends of France, 
Spain, Tartary, and Ireland; Lays and Legends of Germany; Anecdotes and Tradi- 
tions Illustrative of Early English History and Literature; Caxton's Reynard the 
Fox; Gammer Gurton's Pleasant Stories of Patient Grissel ; The Book of the Court, 
etc. Mr. Thoms originated in 1849, and still continues (1872) to edit, Notes and Que- 
ries, of which more than 40 volumes 4to have now been issued, besides 3 volumes of 
Indexes at different periods. 

Samuel Sharpe, a learned archasologist, has written a number of valuable works : 
49 2 M 



678 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Egyptian Inscriptions from the British Museum ; Rudiments of a Vocabulary of the 
Egyptian Hieroglyphics ; Early History of Egypt ; History of Egypt under the Ro- 
mans ; History of Egypt from the Earliest Times till the Conquest of the Arabs; 
Chronology and Geography of Ancient Egypt ; Egyptian Mythology and Early Chris- 
tianity; History of the Hebrew Nation and Literature; Texts fi'om the Holy Bible 
explained by Ancient Monuments, etc. Mr. Sharpe has also made a Translation of 
the Hebrew Scriptures of the Old Testament, and of Griesbach's New Testament, being 
a revision of the authorized versioa. 

Thomas ^A/atts. 

Thomas Watts, 1869, connected his name indissolubly with 

the growth of the Library of the British Museum. 

From the position of mere assistant, Mr. Watts rose to that of Superintendent of the 
Reading Room and Keeper of the Printed Books. His -wonderful linguistic talents — 
he was reputed to be familiar with all the Indo-European languages and many of the 
Semitic and other groups — rendered his services in collecting and cataloguing the 
library simply invaluable. 

It was Mr. Watts's aim for many years to render the department of foreign litera- 
tures as complete as possible, and in this he to a great extent succeeded. In ten years, 
from 1851 to 1860, no less than 80,000 volumes were ordered at his suggestion, and 
in order to make the selection it was necessary to examine at least 600,000 book-titles 
in catalogues. At this day the British Museum has probably the best German library 
outside of Germany, the best French outside of France, and so on through the great 
group of European countries. 

No one who has not himself some experience in selecting books and libraries can 
form even an approximate idea of the labor, and nice, quick judgment involved in 
such an undertaking. Not only must the selector be familiar with the authors them- 
selves and their relative merits, he must know which editions are the best, the prices 
of old and second-hand books, of rare books, anonymous and pseudonymous works, 
scattered, uncollected publications. In short, the management of a library is a sci- 
ence b}'^ itself, and Watts was one of its most distinguished representatives. 

Mr. Watts was not satisfied with his labors as a librarian. He found leisure for 
numerous and valuable contributions to the reviews and critical journals. His sketch 
of the History of the Welsh Language and Literature, which appeared originally in 
Knight's English Cyclopsedia, was reprinted separately in 1861. To this Cyclopaedia 
he furnished no less than one hundred biographical sketches. In 1839 he published 
a letter to Panizzi, then Keeper of the Printed Books in the Museum, in Avhich he 
showed conclusively that "The English Mercuric," reputed to be the earliest English 
pewspaper, was a forgery. A collection of reprints of articles and contributions by 
Watts was published in 1808, under the title of Essays on Language and Literature. 
This contains the well-known sketch of Cardinal Mezzofanti, the wonderful linguist. 

John Pinkerton, 1758-1821, a native of Scotland, was a prominent scholar and anti- 
quarian, and the author of numerous works that exhibit a wonderful mixture of 
information and rubbish, He published some occasional poems, and edited a volume 
of Scottish Tragic Ballads, a few of which, were really of his own composition. His 
Dissertation on the Origin of the Scythians is of little value, and is remarkable for 
its bitter anti-Celtic views. His History of Scotland from the Accession of the House 
of Stuart to that of Mary is tiresome in style but valuable for the matter that it con- 
. tains. His Modern Geography and his Collection of Voyages and Travels are alsQ 
important works. 



THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS. 579 

Thomas Joseph Pettigrew, 1790-1865 ; a native of London ; noted as a surgeon 
and an antiquarian. Besides his special medical works, he published a History of 
Egyptian Mummies, Medical Portrait Gallery, Chronicles of the Tombs (a collection 
of epitaphs), Life of Lord Nelson, Inquiry into the Death of Amy Robsart. Dr. Pet- 
tigrew was a member of many scientific and antiquarian societies. 

WiLUAM Martin Leake, 1777-1860, (Colonel in the British army.) was distinguished 
for his archaeological researches in Greece. The best known of his works are : Re- 
searches in Greece ; Historical Outline of the Greek Revolution ; and Travels in the 
Morea. 

Sm Charles Fellowes, 1799-1860, an English traveller and antiquary, was particu- 
larly celebrated for his explorations of Asia Minor. He discovered the ruins of several 
ancient cities, among others, those of Xanthus the ancient capital of Syria. As 
agent of the British Museum, and by permission of the Turkish Government, he led 
a party of explorers to the valley of Xanthus and brought away a large collection of 
marbles and works of art. He wrote Travels and Researches in Asia Minor ; A Jour- 
nal kept during a Second Excursion in Asia Minor ; An Account of the Xanthian 
Marbles in the British Museum; Account of the Trophy Monument at Xanthus; 
Coins of Ancient Syria. 

Rev. John A. Giles, LL.D., 1802 , a graduate and Fellow of Oxford, has dis- 
tinguished himself both in classical and in old English editorship, and has contributed 
largely to antiquarian and historical literature. His chief classical and editorial 
works are: An English-Greek and Greek-English Lexicon, 8vo; Scriptores Graeci 
Minores, 12mo; Patres Ecclesije Anglicanje, 35 vols., Svo; and The Entire Works of 
Venerable Bede, 12 vols., Svo. He has written the Life and Times of Alfred the Great ; 
Life and Letters of Thomas a Becket ; History of the Ancient Britons; History of 
the Town and Parish of Bampton ; Lives of the Abbots of Weremouth and Yarrow. 



VI. THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS. 

John Henry Newman. 
The Very Kev. John Henry Newman, D. D., 1801 



is an acknowledged leader among the great English theolo- 
gians of the present day. His eminent abilities as a thinker 
and a writer are recognized equally by those who dissent 
from his opinions and those who agree with him. 

Kewman was born in London. He was the eldest son of an English 
banker, his mother being a descendant of a family of French Pro- 
testant refugees. He was educated at the Rev. Dr. Nicholas's school 
at Ealing, and subsequently at Trinity College, Oxford, where he gained 
a scholarship in 1818. In 1822 he was elected Fellow of Oriel. In 
1824 he took the orders of deacon and priest in the Established Church, 
and, in the following year, by appointment of Dr. AYhately, afterwards 
Archbishop of Dublin, became Vice-Principal of Alban Hall, which 
office he resigned for a Tutorship in his College in 1826, 

About this time Newman preached his first University Sermon, and in lS'27-8 he 
was one of the Public Examiners for the degree of Bachelor of Arts. In his rela- 



580 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

tioiis with certain of his friends, and, more particularly, with the Rev. John Keble 
and Richard Hurrell Froude, w^e discern the first elements of the remarkable theolo- 
gical movement in the Church of England, afterwards called Tractarian, in promoting 
which Dr. Newman played so prominent a part. In 1828 he became Vicar of St. 
Mary's, where he delivered the Parochial Sermons, which largely contributed to the 
development of the nascent Oxford school of opinion. He was one of the select Uni- 
versity Preachers from 1830 to 1832, and, after a diligent reading of tlie Fathers, had, 
in the latter year, completed the work entitled The Arians of the Fourth Century, 
the publication of which he deferred till he had made a tour through the south of 
Europe with Mr. Froude. At Rome he began the Lyra Apostolica, which appeared 
monthly in the British Magazine, conducted by Mr. Hugh Rose. 

On his return to England, Newman wrote the first of the celebrated series of Tracts 
for the Times. The leading principles of these were the recognition of "dogma" as 
opposed to " liberalism " in theology, the acknowledgment of " a visible church with 
sacraments and rites which are the channels of invisible grace," and the mainte- 
nance of the notion of an "Apostolical succession of ministry" in the Establish- 
ment. Presently Dr. Pusey furnished a Tract on Fasting, and by the publication of an 
elaborate Treatise on Baptism, and tho starting of the Library of the Fathers, gave 
the new opinions a certain position. Other advocates of the doctrines were Mr. Wil- 
liam Palmer, of Dublin and Worcester College, and Mr. Arthur Perceval. Dr. New- 
man's Church of the Fathers was one of the earliest productions favoring the move- 
ment. 

Subsequently appeared The Prophetical Office of the Church, and an Essay on Jus- 
tification, both controversial works. The Annotated Translation of the Treatise of 
St. Athanasius, historico-dogmatic in its nature, employed him for years. From July, 
1838, to July, 1841, Newman edited the British Critic, to which periodical he had al- 
ready been a contributor. 

In February, 1841, was issued the famous Tract No. 90, the main drift of which was 
to reconcile the holding of several doctrines, apparently characteristic of the Roman 
Catholic Church, with a subscription to the Thirty-Nine Articles of Anglican belief. 
After the storm of indignation which followed the publication of this pamphlet, and 
in consequence, partly, of what is known as the affair of the Jerusalem bishopric, 
Mr. New-man retired to Littlemoi-e, where he had previously built a church, and in 
February, 1843, made "a formal Reti'action of all the hard things," as he expresses 
it, which he had "said against the Church of Rome." In September he resigned the 
living of St. Mary's, Littlemore inclusive. 

He next published Sermons on Subjects of the Day, and An Essay on Ecclesiastical 
Miracles, and wrote The Life of St. Stephen Harding, and for a short time edited a 
series of Lives of the English Saints. Becoming more and more imbued with a belief 
of the views maintained by the Church of Rome, he gave himself to the composition 
of the learned and thoughtful Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, and 
before finishing the work, at Littlemore, October 8, 1845, was received into the Catho- 
lic communion. 

For a while Newman proposed to betake himself to some secular calling. Soon, 
however. Cardinal Wiseman invited him to Oscott, and in 1846 sent him to Rome. In 
1847 he wrote Loss and Gain, a very subjective religious tale, relating the conversion 
of an Anglican to the Catholic faith, and in the next year came back to England, and 
was located as Superior of a congregation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, in Bir- 
mingham. 

Sermons to Mixed Congregations are the fervid offerings of Dr. Newman's heart on 
his new shrine. Lectures on Anglican DiflScul ties, and Lectures on the Position of 
Catholics in England wei-e two other products of his zeal. 



THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS. 581 

In 1852, Father Newman was appointed Rector of the Catholic University newly 
created at Dublin. Here he issued Lectures on the Turks, University Education, and 
Lectures on Univereity Subjects. The Office and Work of Universities, published in 
book-form in 1856, gives an entertaining picture of the Athenian, Roman, and Medise- 
val schools, and contains valuable suggestions as to the relations between colleges and 
universities in modern times. Callista is a sketch of Christianity and Paganism as 
they existed in Africa in the time of St. Cyprian and the Decian persecution. In 1860 
Dr. Newman resigned the rectorship of the University and returned to Birmingham, 
where, as Superior of the Oratory, he still lives. 

In the beginning of 1864 arose a controversy with the Rev. Charles Kingsley, of the 
Establishment, the most important result of which was the publication of Dr. New- 
man's Apologia pro Vita Sua, containing the long-desired history of his religious 
opinions. More recently was written A Letter to Dr. Pusey on Devotion to the 
Blessed Virgin, in reply to some misconceptions put forth by the latter in his Eireni- 
con. In the winter of 1870 appeared An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of .Assent, a work 
of great ability, treating of fundamental principles of Christian belief. Sermons de- 
livered on various occasions have been printed under a title to that effect, and a col- 
lection of his Poems chronologically arranged. 

As a writer of the mother tongue, Dr. Newman is, perhaps, unsurpassed for ease and 
grace of expression, and for general purity of style. He is said to be kindly in his 
manners, intuitively discreet in his intercourse with others, warm in his friendships, 
though an ascetic in temperament, upright and charitable. He has had an eventful 
and singularly important career, and friends and foes alike assign him the position of 
one of the great leaders of modern thought. His life and writings, while of deep lit- 
erary interest, constitute, in their theological and philosophical aspect, an era in the 
history of opinion of a considerable pax-t of the English-speaking race. 

Cardinal Wiseman. 

The Most Eev. Nicholas Wiseman, D. D., 1802-1865, the lead- 
ing English Catholic at the time of his death, was verj eminent as a 
scholar and a writer. 

Cardinal Wiseman was of Catholic descent. He was educated at St. Cuthbert's Col- 
lege, near Durham, and in the English College at Rome. In the latter he was succes- 
sively Professor of Oriental Languages, Vice-Rector, and Rector. He returned to 
England in 1835, and was raised from time to time in ecclesiastical dignity and oflBce, 
He became President of St. Mary's College, Oscott, in 1810 ; Vicar-Apostolic, in 1849; 
Archbishop of Westminster, and Cardinal, in 1850. 

Cardinal Wiseman's writings are numerous, and are held in high estimation. The 
following are his principal works : Twelve Lectures on the Connection between Sci- 
ence and Revealed Religion; The Real Presence of the Body and Blood of our Lord 
Jesus Christ in the Blessed Eucharist ; Lectures on the Principal Doctrines and Prac- 
tices of the Catholic Church ; Lectures on the Offices and Ceremonies of Holy Week ; 
High-Church Claims, or A Series of Papers on the Oxford Controversy; Essays on 
Various Subjects. 

Besides his theological works, and his numerous controversial pamphlets. Cardinal 
Wiseman published many occasional lectures and essays on subjects connected with 
literature and art. These lectures and essays showed broad views and generous cul- 
ture, and gained for the author a lasting place in the respect of his countrymen out- 
side of his own communion. He writes with singular grace and elegance, and his 
thoughts are often strikingly beautiful. 
49^- 



582 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Archbishop Manning. 

The Most Rev. Henry Edward Manning, D. D., 1808 , who 

succeeded Cardinal Wiseman as Arclibishop of Westminster, has writ- 
ten many worlcs, chiefly theological, wliich give hun a high place 
among authors. 

Archbishop Manning, son of William Manning, Esq., M. P., merchant of London, 
was born at Totteridge, Herts, England. He studied at Harrow, and entered Balliol 
College, Oxford, where he graduated Bachelor of Arts, in first-class honors, in 1830, 
and became Fellow of Merton. He was for some time one of the select preachers in 
the University of Oxford, and was appointed Vicar of Lavington in 1834. In 1840 he 
was made Archdeacon of Chichester. The sermons which he delivered in these rela- 
tions are noted for their earnestness of thought and beauty of expression, and pos- 
sessed much influence over the minds of members of the Established Church. 

Among the works published during this period of his life were The Rule of Faith ; 
Holy Baptism; a gracefully written treatise on the Unity of the Church; Thoughts 
for those that Mourn ; and A Letter on The Appellate Jurisdiction of the Crown in 
matters Spiritual. 

In 18.)1, after issuing a protest against the decision in the Gorham Case, resigning 
his preferments, he became a Catholic. He was ordained to the priesthood, and for 
eight years resided, as Superior of a congregation of the Oblates of St. Charles, in 
St. Mary of the Angels, at Bayswater. He composed Lectures on Grounds of Faith, 
and three small treatises on The Temporal Power of the Pope, afterwards reprinted 
in one volume with a general preface. 

In 1862 he wrote a little book on the sacrament of penance called The Love of Jesus 
to Penitents. He delivered many sermons, some of which have ajapeared in pamphlet 
form, among them one entitled The Blessed Sacrament the Centre of Immutable Truth. 
Sevei-al, on ecclesiastical subjects, were collected and republished with an introduc- 
tion on The Relations of England to Christianity. He addressed two controversial 
letters to an Anglican friend, The Crown and Council on the Essays and Reviews, 
and The Convocation and the Crown in Council, and one to the Rev. Dr. Pusey on 
The Workings of the Holj' Spirit in the Church of Englfind. In the same year, 1864, 
he occupied himself with writing The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost, a work 
of great vigor of thought and originality of conception. 

In 1865, on the death of Cardinal Wiseman, Dr. Manning was named Archbishop of 
Westminster. Since then he has been very conspicuous in his defence of Catholic in- 
terests and his devotion to the Holy See. He has written several Pastoral Lettei's to 
his Clergy, all of which have been remarkable for ability. 

In 1869 he was called to Rome to take ijart in the (Ecumenical Council, and before 
leaving home he issued a Pastoral upon The (Ecumenical Council and the Infallibility 
of the Roman Pontiff. He was nominated by the Pope on the Committee upon Peti- 
tions, and was elected by the Fathers to represent England on the Committee on the 
Faith. He was present at almost every session of the Council, and during the delib- 
erations spoke, it is said, with great effect. 

On the adjournment of the Council, in the summer of 1870, he returned to London, 
and addressed his clergy in an important Pastoral on The Vatican Council and its 
Definitions. Since then a sermon on Rome the Capital of Christendom has attracted 
attention, and an article iu The Contemporary Review on The Relations of Will to 
Thought. 

Of late, Archbishop Manning has been caring for the siibject of Catholic education, 
and other matters closely related to the general well-being of his diocese. 



THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS. 583 

In 1871 lie published two correlated works : The Four Chief Evils of the Day, and 
TJie Fourfold Sovereignty of God, both which are mentioned in high terms of com- 
mendation. 

William George Ward, 1812 , was one of the Oxford 

scholars concerned in the Tractarian movement, and with many others 
went over to the Church of Rome. 

"Ward had won high distinction at the University by his mathematical and classical 
attainments. He has been for some years Professor of Dogmatic Theology in the 
Catholic College of St. Edmund's, near Ware, and also Editor of the Dublin Review, 
which work he has conducted with signal ability. Other works: The Ideal of a 
Christian Church ; The Anglican Establishment Contrasted with the Church Catholic 
of Every Age ; Nature and Grace ; etc. 

Kenelm Digby. 

Kenelm Henry Digby, 1800 , a member of the Anglican 

Church who went over to the Church of Rome, has written a number 
of literary works, both before and after his conversion, which have 
attracted attention by their learning and by the elegant style of their 
composition. 

Mr. Digby is the youngest son of the Very Rev. William Digby, Dean of Clonfert, 
Ireland, and a member of the family represented by Lord Digby. He was educated at 
Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated Bachelor of Arts in 1823. He de- 
lighted in the study of the scholastic system of theology and of the philosophy and 
literature -of the Middle Ages, and became extensively acquainted with these subjects 
of his research. 

Much of the result of his earlier investigations is contained in The Broad Stone of 
Honour, or Rules for the Gentlemen of England, in which is described, in glowing 
terms, the Christian chivalry of the olden time. The first two editions of it were 
published anonymously : afterwards, on becoming a Catholic, Pigby re-wrote the 
work and issued it under his name. Archdeacon Hare praises it warmly as rich "in 
magnanimous and holy thoughts, arid in tales of honour and of piety." " If one some- 
times thinks," he says, "'that the author loses himself amid the throng of knightly 
and saintly personages whom he calls up before us, it is with the feeling with which 
Milton must have regarded the moon, when he likened her to 

' One that had been led astray 
Through the heaven's wide pathless way.' 

If he strays, it is 'through the heaven's wide pathless way: ' if he loses himself, it is 
among the stars. In truth this is an essential, and a very remarkable feature of his 
catholic spirit. He identifies himself, as few have ever done, with the good and great 
and heroic and holy in former times, and ever rejoices in passing out of himself into 
them: he loves to utter his thoughts and feelings in their words, rather than his 
own ; and the saints and philosophers and wai'rJors of old join in swelling the sacred 
consort which rises heavenward from his pages." 

From 1831 to 1842, DigV)y devoted himself to the composition of his great work, 
Mores Catholici, or Ages of Faith, a work of prodigious labor and learning, giving 
in glowing colors a picture of the society of mediaeval times. Compitum, or the Meet- 



584 TENIs^YSOX AXD HIS CONTEMPO R AEIES . 

ing Vi'ays of the Catholic Church, appeared, in several Tolumes, between the years 
1848 and 185-1. In spirit and conception, it resembles the other books. More recently 
Avere_printed The Lover's Seat, The Children's Bower, and the leisurely Evenings on 
the Thames, or Serene IToiirs, besides a collection of Short Poems, written with an 
easy, flowing, almost negligent grace of style. 

Pusey. 

Edward Botyerie Pusey, D.D., 1800 , Eegius Professor of 

Hebrew in the University of Oxford, is well known as one of the ablest 
and most Yoluminous writers in the English Church at the present 
day, and one of the founders of a school of theology that goes by his 
name. 

Dr. Pusey first came prominently before the public as the author, jointly with New- 
man, Keble, and others, of a series of pamphlets and volumes, begun in 1833, called 
Tracts for the Times. Seldom, in the history of opinion, has such an influence been 
produced by the force of mere discussion and argument, as that produced by the pa- 
tient and persistent labors of these recluse and quiet scholai's, in the preparation of 
this series of Tracts. 

In addition to his share in this work. Dr. Pusej'has written a large number of other 
works on the same or kindred subjects. The following are a few : An Historical In- 
quiry into the Probable Causes of the Rationalistic Character lately Predominant in 
the Theology of Germany ; The Tendency to Romanism Imputed to Doctrines held of 
old, as now, in the English Church ; Scriptural Yiews of Holy Baptism ; The Doctrine 
of the Real Presence as Contained in the Fathers of the Church ; The Real Presence 
of the Body and Blood of Cbrist the Doctrine of the English Church ; Eirenicon, or 
The Church of England a Portion of Chrisfs One Holy Catholic Church; Means of 
Restoring Yisible Unity, etc. For one of his sermons, entitled The Holy Eucharist a 
Comfort to the Penitent, Dr. Pusey was suspended from preaching from 1813 to 18J:6. 

Isaac Williams, , formerly a Fellow of Trinity College, 

Oxford, and one of the writers of Tracts for the Times, besides his emi- 
nence as a theological writer, has an enviable reputation as a hymnist, 
and as a sacred poet. 

The following are his principal works : Hj-mns for Children ; Hymns from the Pa- 
risian Breviary ; Hymns on the Church Catechism ; The Cathedral, or the Catholic 
and Apostolic Church of England, a series of poems ; Thoughts in Past Years, Poems ; 
Sacred Yerses, with Pictures, illustrating Our Lord's Life; The Altar, or Meditations 
in Verse on the Great Christian Sacrifice. His other w^ritings on religious subjects 
are many and voluminous. Harmony and Commentarj- on the "Whole Gospel Narra- 
tive, 8 vols., Svo ; The Baptistery, or The Way to Eternal Life, 2 vols., 8vo ; Plain Ser- 
mons on the Catechism ; Sermons on the Epistle and Gospel for each Sunday in the 
Year, 2 vols.; The Characters of the Old Testament; Female Characters of the Holy 
Scriptures; The Psalms Interpreted of Christ, 3 vols., etc. 



THEOLOGICAL AND EELIGIOUS. 585 



F. W. Newman. 

Feaxcis William Newmax, 1805 , a younger brother of Jolm 

Henry Newman, instead of following in the lead of the Tracts for the 
Times, went rather in the direction of Essays and Eeviews, and be- 
came one of the representatives of infidel opinion in England. 

Mr. Newman was educated at Oxford, where lie took double first in classics and 
mathematics, although not personally so pre-eminent as his brother. He is the author 
of numerous works and treatises, some on scientific, some on classical subjects, some 
on political economy, chiefly, however, on theological subjects. Those which have 
attracted most attention are: The History of the Hebrew Monarchy ; The Soul — its 
Sorrows and Inspirations ; and Phases' of Faith. This last work appeared in 1850. 

In 1852 there appeared The Eclipse of Faith, by Henry Rogers, in which deism is 
represented by an imaginary pupil of Newman's, and the substance of the deistical 
doctrines is taken from Phases of Faith. To this Newman replied, and Rogers re- 
joined in a Defence. The controversy was carried on in an acrimonious spirit, and 
yielded no positive results. 

In addition to his controversial and argumentative writings, Newman is the author 
of metrical translations of the Odes of Horace and the Iliad of Homer. He has also 
published a Personal Narrative of his travels in Turkey, and contributed to the Eclec- 
tic and the Westminster Reviews. He has occupied the Professorship of Languages 
in Manchester New College and of Latin in University College, London. 

Rowland Williams. 

EowLAXD Williams, D. D., 1817-1870, an eminent Cambridge 
scholar, and a native of Wales, was one of the writers of " Essays and 
Be views." 

For his part in this work he was convicted of heresy before the Court of Arches, 
hut he obtained a reversal of the sentence before the Privy Council. He wrote Rational 
Godliness; Christianity and Hinduism ; Buusen's Biblical Researches ; The Difficulty 
of Bringing Theological Questions to an Issue; Persecution for the Word; Tlie 
Prophets of Israel and Judah, etc. 

Eev. Henry B. Wilson, 1804 , was one of the authors of 

" Essays and Eeviews." 

He was educated at Oxford, where he gained high honors in classics. He became 
Professor of Anglo-Saxon, and in 1850 was Bampton Lecturer. He has published The 
Communion of Saints, an attempt to illustrate the true principles of Christian union, 
being his course of Bampton Lectures ; and several Sermons and Pamphlets. 

John Frederick Dexnisox Maurice, 1805 , studied at Cambridge. He was for 

a time Professor of English Literature and Modern History in King's College, London, 
and was recently appointed Professor of Moral Philosophy at Cambridge. Mr. Maurice 
is a clergyman of the Church of England, and a leader of the Broad Church party. 
Of his many contributions to theological literature the most important are : Prophets 
and Kings of the Old Testament; The Kingdom of Christ; Religious of the World; 
Philosophy of the Middle Ages; Philosophy of the First Six Centuries; Conflict of 



686 TENJSTYSON AND HIS COXTE MPOR ARIES . 

Good and Evil in Our Day. He was also associated with Charles Kingsley, Trench, 
Brewer, and others in the Lectures to Ladies on Practical Subjects. Mr. Maurice's 
works are those of a profound, earnest thinker, keenly alive to the necessities of the 
age in which he lives and imbued with a sense of the power of the Christian spirit. 

Bishop Colenso. 

Joib.:n ^Y. Colenso, D. D., 1814 , a clergyman of the English 

Church and Bishop of Natal, in South Africa, became very notorious 
by the publication of several volumes impugning the inspiration and 
the historical accuracy of several of the books of the Bible. 

Bishop Colenso's works are the following : The Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua 
Critically Examined ; St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, Newly Translated, and Ex- 
plained from a Missionary Point of View; Village Sermons ; Natal Sermons, etc. He 
published also, before going to Africa, works on Arithmetic, Algebra, and Trigonome- 
ti-y, which had an extensive sale as school-books. Colenso was born in the Duchy of 
Cornwall, and was educated at Cambridge, where he was distinguished as a scholar. 
He was made Bishop of Natal in 1854. 

Key. Baden Powell, F. E. S., 1796-1860, was Professor of Geom- 
etry at Oxford for the last thirty-three years of his life. 

He was a man not only of great learning, but of great intellectual activity, and 
filled a large space in the world of opinion at Oxford. He was one of the authors of 
" Essays and Reviews," and his article on The Evidences of Christianity, in which he 
denies the possibility of miracles, excited a hot discussion. His publications are nu- 
merous. The following are some of them: Revelation and Science; Rational Religion 
Examined; Connection of Natural and Divine Trath ; Tradition Unveiled; State Edu- 
cation ; The Spirit of Inductive Philosophy ; The Unity of Worlds ; The Philosophy 
of Creation; Christianity without Judaism ; The Order of Nature in Reference to the 
Claims of Revelation, etc. 

The authors of Essays and Reviews went to the other extreme from the authors of 
Tracts for the Times, and in their rebound from the shackles of Tradition attempted 
to throw off the bonds of Revelation also. Baden Powell was one of the ablest, bold- 
est, and most ultra of the school to which he belonged. 

Eev. Dickson Hampden, D. D., 1794-1868, is notorious for the con- 
troversy occasioned by his appointment as Kegius Professor of Divinity 
at Oxford. 

In his previous publications he had shown a decided leaning to what were known as 
Germanizing views in theology. A very large party in the English Church con- 
sidered him unsound in the faith, and his appointment as an insult to the University. 
The agitation which followed his appointment has only been equalled in modern 
times by that connected with Pusey and Newman and the " Tracts for the Times." 
Dr. Hampden was afterwards promoted to the Bishopric of Hereford. He was born 
in Barbadoes, and educated at Oxford. 

His chief publications are the following : The Scholastic Philosophy considered in 
its relation to Christian Theology, a course of Bampton Lectures ; Pliilosophical Evi- 



THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS. 587 

dence of Christianity ; Lectures on Moral Philosophy ; Religious Dissent ; Tradition; 
The Work of Christ and the Spirit ; Sermons, etc. 

Dean Stanley. 

Arthub Penryn Stanley, D. D., 1815 , Dean of Canterbury, 

is one of the most accomplished theologians of the age. He is at 
present the leader of the Broad Church party in England. 

Dean Stanley is the son of the late Bishop Stanley. He was educated at Rugby, 
under Dr. Arnold, and afterwards at Oxford, in both which places he was distinguished 
for scholarship. Besides numerous pamphlet Addresses and Sermons, and contribu- 
tions to Smith's Dictionaries, Dr. Stanley has published The Life of Arnold ; Memoir 
of Bishop Stanley ; Sermons and Essays on the Apostolic Age ; The Epistles to the 
Corinthians, a critical commentary, 2 vols.; Sinai and Palestine; Sermons on the 
Unity of Evangelical and Apostolic Teaching; Lectures on the Jewish Church; Ser- 
mons before the University of Oxford ; Historical Memorials of Canterbury, and of 
Westminster Abbey. 

John Egbert Seeley, , Professor of Modern History in 

Cambridge, has won great distinction by his work, Ecce Homo. 

In this work, which is one of singular beauty and elegance, Prof. Seeley has en- 
deavored to show, more fully than had ever before been done, the human side of our 
Lord's character. The studied silence of the book in regard to our Lord's divine 
character, leaving it in doubt wliether the writer really believed Him to be divine, has 
caused the large body of Christians, both in England and America, to look with dis- 
favor upon the work, notwithstanding the extraordinary fascinations of its style. 
Other works of Prof. Seeley ai'e Roman Imperialism, English Lessons for English 
People. 

F. W. Robertson. 

Eev. Frederick AV. Eobertson, 1816-1853, is one of the few 
clergymen who have made a strong impression on the general mind 
by the publication of Sermons. 

Sermons in the pulpit form no inconsiderable part of the mental food of the com- 
munity. But they are usually a drug when published, as every bookseller knows. 
Robertson's Sermons are an exception. There is in them a freshness of thought and 
of expression that have given them a place in popular literature. 

Mr. Robertson was the son of an army officer, and was designed by his father for 
the military profession, but preferred that of preaching the gospel. He was educated 
at Oxford. The principal scene of his ministerial labors was at Brighton, where his 
preaching made a powerful impression. His early death, at the age of thirty-seven, 
cut short what promised to be a most distinguished 'career. 

Besides the five series of Sermons, he published several Addresses on literary and 
social topics, which were marked by great originality of thought. Two of tliese are 
worthy of particular mention. An Analj'sis of Tennyson's "In Memoriam," and The 
Influences of Poetry on the Working-Classes. His Life and Letters has been published 
in 1 vol., his Sermons in 2 vols., and his Lectures and Addresses in 2 vols., and have 
been reprinted in various forms in the United States. 



588 TEJ^NYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

William Thomson, D.D., 1819 , Archbishop of York, has 

published some able works on Theology and Metaphysics. 

Archbishop Thomson is the author of an Outline of the Necessary Laws of Thought, 
wiiich has been highly praised, and has been adopted as a text-book in many collegiate 
institutions in the United States. His principal works, however, are theological in 
their nature. In 1853 he delivered the Bampton course of lectures at Oxford, on The 
Atoning Work of Christ. Several volumes of his Sermons have also been collected 
and published. In 1869 he published his Limits of Philosophical Inquiry. He is 
the editor of Aids to Faith, a collection of essays in reply to the well-known Essays 
and Reviews. 



John Bird Sumner, D. J)., 1780-1862, late Archbishop of Canter- 
bury, was greatly respected by all parties for his moderation and somid- 
ness of judgment, as well as for his learning. 

His principal works are the following : Essay to show that the Prophecies now Ac- 
complishing are an Evidence of the Truth of the Christian Religion ; Apostolical Preach- 
ing; On the Records of Creation; On Christian Faith and Character ; Evidences of 
Christianity derived from its Nature and Reception; On the Princiiial Festivals of the 
Christian Church ; On the Christian Ministry ; Practical Expositions in the Form of 
Lectures. 

Whately. 

EiCHARD Whately, D. D., 1787-1863, was educated at Oxford; 
took orders in the English Church, and rose to great distinction, occu- 
pying various important posts, among them the Bishopric of Kildare, 
and the Archbishopric of Dublin. 

Whately's literary productions are so numerous and so diversified that it would be 
impossible to cite in this place even a bare list of them. His earliest published pro- 
duction was the well-known work entitled Historic Doubts Relative to Napoleon 
Bonaparte. It was an instance of what the logicians call the reductio ad absurdum, 
that is, the young churchman attempted to show that the principles of reasoning 
employed by infidels against the New Testament might be made to prove that such a 
man as Napoleon never existed. The work attracted much attention at the time, and 
was translated into several continental languages. 

For some years before being nominated to the Archbishopric of Dublin, Whately 
was Tutor in Oriel College, Oxford, also Principal of St. Alban's Hall, and Professor 
of Political Economy. His contemporaries at Oxford included such men as Ar- 
nold, Keble, Pusey, and Newman. It was during this period that he published his 
best known works. Among them are his Treatises on Logic and on Rhetoric, which 
have been the stumbling-block of so many generations of collegians, his Essays on the 
Peculiarities of the Christian Religion, on the Difi&culties in St. Paul, and on the Errors 
of Romanism. 

After his appointment as Archbishop, he took a deep and steadfast interest in Ire- 
land, and especially in the Board of National Education, of which he was for many 
years a member. Nor did his pastoral duties prevent him from continuing his author- 
ship. Indeed, it has been remarked of him that he was always either writing himself, 
or helping some one else to write. His literary labors appeared chiefly in the shape 



THEOLOGICAL AND EELIGIOUS. 589 

of lectures, pamphlets, occasional discourses, and pastoral charges, and present a 
formidable aggregate of titles and a vast mass of matter. 

Among the few large works of this period is his well-known Edition of Bacon's Essays 
with Annotations. This is a model of editorial workmanship, and the best edition of 
Bacon for the ground which it covei-s. Other remarkable productions of this period 
are his Kingdom of Christ, his Introductory Lectures on the Study of St. Paul's Epis- 
tles, and his English Synonyms. 

"Whately may be set down as a man of learning and of great acuteness of thought, 
but without metaphysical profundity. His Logic has been sharply criticized by Mill 
and by Sir William Hamilton. It is undoubtedly a good text-book for instructing be- 
ginners in the rudiments of the formal side of logic. But it cannot lay claim to being 
a treatise on the science of pure thought. Whately's theological works are charac- 
terized by fairness and by an earnest spirit of inquiry after the truth. They are, upon 
the whole, the most satisfactory of his writings. The Archbishop was, while a stu- 
dent, rough and uncouth in his manners, but became toned down with age and expe- 
rience, and also lost much, if not all, of his acrimony in debate. In politics and in 
theology he was liberal, but without running to extremes in any of his views. 

Faber. 

George Stanley Faeee, 1773-1854, was one of the most learned 
and prolific writers tliat the English Church has produced in recent 
times. 

He was a graduate of Cambridge, and was elected a Fellow there, before the age of 
twenty-one. He rose to be Prebendary of Salisbury, and finally Master of Sherburn 
Hospital. 

His writings are exceedingly numerous, and are all such as mark accurate scholar- 
ship and unusual mental vigor. The following are the chief: Horse MosaicEE, a Tiew 
of the Mosaic Records, beiug the Bampton Lectures for 1801, 2 vols., Svo ; A Disserta- 
tion on the Mysteries of the Cabyri, or the Great Gods of Phoenicia, 2 vols., Svo; The 
Arminiau and Calvinistic Controversy, Svo ; Dissertation on the Prophecies relating 
to the Papal and Mohammedan apostasies, 3 vols., Svo; Tiew of the Prophecies relat- 
ing to Judah and Israel, 2 a'oIs., Svo: The Seventy Weeks of Daniel, Svo ; The Ordi- 
nary Operations of the Holy Spirit, Svo; The Origin of Papal Idolatry, 3 vols., 4to ; 
The Genius and Object of the Patriarchal, Levitical, and Christian Dispensations, 2 
vols., Svo ; The Difficulties of Infidelity, Svo ; The Difiiculties of Romanism, 2 vols., 
Svo ; The Sacred Calendar of Prophecy, 3 vols., Svo ; The Primitive Docti-ines of Elec- 
tion, Justification, Regeneration ; The Apostolicity of Trinitarianism, 2 a'oIs., Svo ; 
Provincial Letters, 2 vols., 12mo ; The Promise of a Mighty Deliverer, 2 vols., Svo, etc. 
His separate works number forty-two, and run through a period of fifty-five years of 
active authorship. 

"Mr. Faber is the most voluminous writer of the age. Tor several years his publi- 
cations have appeared with surprising rapidity, considering their nature ; and yet not 
one of them bears any mark of undue haste. His Hora; Mosaicae, Origin of Idolatrj', 
liifificulties of Romanism, DiflBculties of Infidelity, and Treatises on Election, Justifica- 
tion, Regeneration, Apostolicity of Trinitarianism, etc., are among the most valuable 
publications of modern times." — Edward William'' s Christian Preacher. 

50 



590 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Home. 

Thomas Hartwell Horne, D.D., 1780-1862, is known among 
biblical students everywhere by his Introduction to the study of thii 
Scriptures. 

He received his early education at the Christ's Hospital School, London, vrhere he 
was a fellow-student with Coleridge. He left the school at the age of fifteen, with a 
high character for scholarship, and, not having the means of going to the University, 
obtained employment for eight years as clerk to barristers. In this humble position, 
having a good deal of leisure on his hands, he gave his attention to literature and 
study. 

His first publication, The Necessity and Truth of the Christian Revelation, was writ- 
ten when he was only eighteen. In the preparation of this book, he felt the neces- 
sity of some such work in the study of the Scriptures as that which he himself after- 
wards made, and he set himself deliberately to collecting the materials and acquiring 
the varied knowledge needed for its composition. This work, published originally in 
3 vols., large 8vo, and gradually inci-eased in successive editions to 5 a'oIs., became the 
acknowledged text-book on the subject in nearly ail institutions of theological learn- 
ing, both in England and America. It has passed through a greater number of edi- 
tions, probably, than any other work of like erudition and extent. 

Besides his " Introduction," Horne wi'ote and edited a large number of other works, 
partly legal, but mostly theological. No less than forty-five of these are enumerated, 
many of them in 4to and 8vo, and some extending to several volumes. A few only 
need be named : Deism Refuted; The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity ; History of 
the Mohammedan Empire in Spain; Outlines for the Classification of a Library, etc., 
etc. Much that he did was mere hack work, done for daily bread. 

Trench. 

EiCHARD Cheyenix Trench, D. D., 1807 , has gained great 

celebrity by his various popular essays on the study of English ; he is 
also a voluminous writer on theological subjects. 

He studied at Cambridge ; took orders in the Church of England ; and, after filling 
various incumbencies, was made Dean of Westminster iu 1856, and Archbishop of 
Dublin in 1864. 

It would be impossible to cite in this place a complete, or even a partially complete, 
list of his works, and yet it is not easy to make a selection among them. The most 
Ijrominent of his homiletic works, perhaps, are Notes on the Parables of Our Lord, 
Notes on the Miracles of our Loi'd, The Fitness of Holy Scripture for Unfolding the 
Spiritual Life, On the Lessons in Proverbs, and A Commentary on the Epistles to the 
Seven Churches. Besides these he has published a number of single Sermons and Dis- 
courses. As an expounder of Christian doctrine, Dean Trench is characterized by 
clearness, grace, and breadth of view. He belongs to the moderate Evangelical party 
in the Church of England, and is one of the great leaders of sound Christian thought 
in that country. 

But the Dean is no less celebrated as a scholar. It may be said that he has con- 
tributed, by his e.ssay On the Study of Words, and by his English Past and Present, 
more than any other writer before Max MUUer, to awaken and sustain an interest in 
the popular mind for the study of the mother tongue. These works do not profess to 
be strictly scientific, and some of the author's views require modification or correc- 



THEOLOGICAL AND EELIGIOUS. 591 

tion. But they have the great merit of being perfectly adapted to the reader of gene- 
ral culture, and of urging most happily the claims of a hitherto neglected study. Few- 
books are more interesting and profitable for the young college student. 

Of a more strictly scientific character are his essay On Some Deficiencies in our Eng- 
lish Dictionaries, and A Select Glossary of English Words used formerly in senses dif- 
ferent from the present. 

So important have been the Dean's services in the study of English that he was 
chosen chairman of the committee of the (English) Philological Society intrusted with 
the preparation of a new English Dictionary. This work, according to the prospectus, 
was to be exhaustive and thoroughly scientific, to be a complete ti-easury of English 
words from the earliest times down to the present day. It is a matter of universal 
regret that so noble an undertaking should, as it seems, have fallen through. 

The Uean, however, is not merely a scholar and a theologian, but also a poet. His 
earliest publication was a volume of Poems, among them The Story of Justin Martyr. 
Since then he has published Elegiac Poems; Poems from Eastern Sources; Alni;a; 
and a translation of Calderon's Life's a Dream. Dean Trench's poetical productions 
are marked by great delicacy of feeling and exquisite beauty. 

A 1 ford. 

Henry Alford, D. J)., 1810-1871, Dean of Canterbury, is the 
author of several important works, literary and theological. 

The most elaborate and scholarly of his works is his Edition of the New Testament, 
in 4 vols. Some of his other publications are the following : School of the Heart 
and Other Poems, 2 vols. ; Abbot of Mucheliiaye and Other Poems ; Chapters on the 
Poets of Ancient Greece ; Psalms and Hymns adapted to the Sundays and Holidays 
throughout the Year ; The Consistency of the Divine Conduct in Revealing the Doc- 
trines of Redemption, being the Hulsean Lectures for 18il ; Village Sermons; and 
The Queen's English. 

The work last named was intended to expose some of the common corruptions of 
the English by careless writers and speakers. It owes its chief celebrity, however, 
to the merciless severity with which its own bad English was criticized by Mr. Moon 
in his work, The Dean's English. 

S. T. Bloomfield, D. D., 1790 , was a scholar and divine of high standing, par- 
ticularly in the line of biblical criticism. His principal works are The Greek Testa- 
ment, with English Notes, Critical, Philological, and Explanatory, 2 vols.; College 
and School Greek Testament, with English Notes ; Greek and English Lexicon of the 
New Testament, being Robinson's work with additions ; Recensio Synoptiea Annota- 
tionis Sacrae, A Critical Digest and Synoptical Arrangement of the Most Important 
Annotations on the New Testament, 8 vols., 8vo. The work last named is for schol- 
ars of the present day what Pool's Synopsis Criticorum was to those of a former gen- 
eration. Besides these works in the field of bi1)lical literature. Dr. Bloomfield has 
produced aTi English translation of Thucydides, in 3 vols., which is regarded as a 
masterly performance. 

Alexander Keitr, D. D., 1701 , has written Evidences of the Truth of the Chris- 
tian Religion from the Literal Fulfilment of Prophecy ; The Signs of the Times; 
The Land of Israel ; The Harmony of Prophecj', etc. The first of these, commonly 
called Keith on the Prophecies, has had an extensive circulation, and has caused con- 
siderable discussion. 



592 te:n^nyson and his contemporaries. 

Tregelles. 

Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, 1813 , is acknowledged to be 

the most eminent living critic of the text of the New Testament, with 
the exception of Tischendorf. 

Mr. Tregelles was born at Falmouth, Cornwall, and attended the classical Grammar- 
School of that place from the age of thirteen to fifteen. At the age of fifteen he 
entered the Iron Works in North Abby, Glamorganshire, and was engaged tliere for 
six years. He afterwards engaged for two years in private tuition. The extraordinary 
attainments which he has made, therefore, in his special line of scholarship, have 
been gained without the advantages of a University education, and with only such 
leisure and means as he has won by the hardest work. 

His great work, the crown and fruit of all his other labors, is his new critical edi- 
tion of The Greek Testament. In the preparation of this, he visited the great libra- 
ries of Europe, and personally inspected and collated every known Manuscript of 
the New Testament of any considerable antiquity. His other works, which are nu- 
merous, are mostly connected with the subject of textual criticism, and preparatory 
to this, his great work. They need not be here enumerated. 

Baptist Noel. 

Hon. and Key. Baptist Wriothesley Noel, 1799 , brother 

of the Earl of Gainsborough, is a native of Leightmont, Scotland. 

He graduated at Cambridge, in 1826, with great distinction, and took orders in the 
Chui-ch of England. In 1848 he became a Baptist, and entered the ministry of that 
church. He is very distinguished as <a preacher, and has written many works which 
have been well received. Notes of a Tour in Ireland ; Sermons on the First Five Cen- 
turies of the Chui-ch; To the Unconverted; On Regeneration; On the Messiah; On 
Glorying in Christ; On Christian Missions; Case of the Free Church of Scotland; 
Meditations in Sickness and Old Age ; Protestant Thoughts in Rhyme ; The Catholic 
Claims, etc. 

Spurgeon. 

Key. Charles H. Spurgeon, 1834 , of the Baptist Church, is 

one of the most celebrated preachers in London. 

Mr. Spurgeon was born at Kelverdon, Essex. After passing through school, and 
teaching for two years, he began preaching in 1850, being then only sixteen years old ; 
and he was only nineteen when he began to preach in London. His preaching at- 
tracted at once the public attention, and he has held it now for more than twenty 
years, drawing larger congregations than any which, in recent times, have for so long 
a period attended the preaching of any one man. 

In 1854 Mr. Joseph Passmore began a regular weekly publication of Mr. Spurgeon's 
sermon of the Sunday previous, selling it at a penny a number, and at the close of 
the year making a yearly volume. Fifteen or sixteen of these volumes have been pub- 
lished in London. These Sermons have been reprinted in New York, in 8 vols., and 
the aggregate sale in the United States has been between 300,000 and 400,000 
volumes. 

Besides the Sermons, Mr. Spurgeon has published The Saint and His Saviour; 



THEOLOGICAL AND EELIGIOUS. 593 

Smooth Stones taken from Ancient Brooks ; Gleanings among the Sheaves ; Morning 
by Morning, or Daily Readings ; Evening by Evening, or Readings at Eventide ; John 
Ploughman's Talks, or Plain Advice for Plain People, etc. "Of all Sermons that we 
know, those of Spurgeon are the most readable. They are sound in doctrine, vigor- 
ous in style, fresh in thought, warm in religious sentiment. They go to the very heart 
of religious experience, and edify and comfort the true believer, while they are also 
pungent, and awakening in appeal to the impenitent." — Fresbyterian. 

OcTA\Tnrs WixsLOW, D.D., , a distinguished Baptist min- 
ister of London, has been a prolific writer, his writings being mainly 
on practical religion. 

More than forty different volumes of his are enumerated. The following are the 
titles of a few of these excellent and popular volumes ; The Work of the Holy Spirit ; 
Christ the Theme of the Missionary ; Personal Declension and Revival of Religion in 
the Soul ; Glory of the Redeemer in his Person and his Work ; Morning Thoughts ; 
Evening Thoughts: Patriarchal Shadows of Christ, etc. 

Henry Melville, 1798 , has been generally considered the most finished pulpit 

orator in London for the last thirty years. Many volumes of his Sermons have been 
printed, some with and some without his sanction. They are written in a highly 
imaginative strain, but are finished specimens of composition, and justify the popu- 
larity which has always attended his preaching. 

JoHX AxGELL James, 1785-1859, was one of the ablest and most 
popular of the English Independents in the present century. 

He was settled for a long time at Birmingham, and he exerted an extensive influ- 
ence, both by his preaching and his writings. The latter were almost exclusively of 
a practical kind, and have had a large circulation both in England and America. 
The following are best known : The Anxious Inquirer; The Church in Earnest ; An 
Earnest Ministry the Want of the Times ; Christian Fellowship : The Christian Father's 
Present; The Christian Professor, and about twenty others. 

Hexrt Rogers, 1814 , an English Independent divine, was Professor of the 

English Language and Literature in King's College, London ; afterwards Professor in 
Spring Hill College, Birmingham ; and in 1857 successor to Dr. Yaughan as Principal 
of Lancashire Independent College, Manchester. Principal Rogers enjoys a high 
reputation as a writer. The following are his principal writings: Essay on the Life 
and Writings of Jonathan Edwards ; The Life and Character of John Howe ; Lectures 
on English Grammar and Composition; Essays from the Edinburgh Review, 3 vols.; 
The Eclipse of Faith. The work last named has caused an extended controversy. 

Robert Philip, 1792-1858, an eminent Dissenter of London, published a large num- 
ber of treatises on practical religion, which have been highly esteemed, and have had 
a large circulation. Six of these volumes appeared under the name of " Guides : " 
Guide to tlie Perjjlexed; to the Devotional; to the Thoughtful; to the Doubting; to 
the Conscientious ; to Communicants. He wrote also four volumes, which formed the 
Lady's Closet Library, namely. The Marys, or the Beauty of Female Holiness: The 
Marthas, or Varieties of Female Piety ; The Lydias, or Development of Female Char- 
acter; The Hannahs, or Maternal Influence on Sous. Some of his other publications 
60* 2N 



594 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

are Redemption, or the New Song in Heaven ; The Comforter, or the Love of the 
Spiint ; The Eternal, or the Attributes of Jehovah ; Manly Piety in its Prhiciples ; 
Manly Piety in its Realizations; and several biographical memoirs of eminent min- 
isters. 

Philip Bennett Power, , a clergyman of the English Church, has written 

about fifty Sunday-School books and manuals of devotion and religious experience, 
which have been very popular, and have had an extensive sale, one of them being 
counted by ninety-five thousand, another by seventy thousand, and most of them 
by tens of thousands. 

The following are the titles of some of these small volumes : The Oiled Feather ; 
John Clipstick's Clock; Little Kitty's Knitting-Needles ; Paddle Your Own Canoe; 
Stamp on it, John ; The Man Who Kept Himself in Repair ; Tlie Man Who Ran Away 
from Himself; Christ the Model for Sunday-School Teachers; Appointed Times; Ex- 
perience of a Church-Plate; Breathings of the Soul; Waiting upon God, etc. Mr. 
Power's volumes are among the best of their kind. 

Rev. Newman Hall, 1816 , a graduate of London University, and a very eloquent 

and persuasive preacher at Surrey Chapel, London, has published several small religious 
essays, of which many tens of thousands have been sold: Come to Jesus; Follow 
Jesus ; It is I ; Italy, the Land of the Forum and the Vatican ; Life of William Gor- 
don, M.D., etc. 

Cumming. 

JoHK Gumming, D. J)., 1810 , a native of Scotland, has been 

minister for the last forty years to one of the Scotch churches in 
London. 

Dr. Cumming is almost equally eminent as an orator and as a writer, and his labors 
in both these departments of effort have been about equally divided between such as 
arc homiletic and such as are controversial. In the great question of the Free Church 
of Scotland he took ground against Dr. Chalmers and disruption. He has written and 
preached much against the Papacy, and he has spent a large amount of intellectual 
effort towards unveiling the secrets of the Book of Revelation and other apocalyptic 
writings in the Bible. Others of his works, perhaps a majority of them, are directed 
to tlie ordinary topics of the pulpit. Dr. Cumming's style is singularly pleasing and 
persuasive. 

The sale of Dr. Ctmiming's works is said to be very large, and the works are al- 
most too numerous even to mention. The following are the chief: The Great Tribu- 
lation ; Apocalyptic Sketches; The Church of Scotland ; Almost Protestant; Discus- 
sions upon Protestantism; Lectures on Christ's Miracles; On the Parables; On the 
Seven Churches; On Daniel; Sabbath Readings on Genesis ; on Exodus; on Leviti- 
cus; The Finger of God; Christ our Passover; The Comforter; A Message from God; 
The Great Sacrifice; The Tent and the Altar ; God in History; Voices of the Day; 
Voices of the Night; Voices of the Dead; Infant Salvation; The Baptismal Font; 
The Communion Table ; Lectures for the Times ; Occasional Discourses, etc., etc. 

James Hamilton, D. D., 1814-1867, a Presbyterian divine, was for 
a long time the leading ornament of the London pulpit. 



THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS. 595 

Dr. namilton was born at Paisley, Scotland, and -was settled about 1840 in London, 
where he continued to preach during the remaining years of his life. His published 
works are on subjects of practical religion, and are nearly as popular a« was his 
preaching. They have been issued by the various religious publication societies of 
both countries, and the sales are counted by many tens of thousands. The follovdng 
are the chief: Life in Earnest; Mount of Olives; The Harp on the Willows; The 
Church in the House ; The Lamp and the Lantern ; Emblems from Eden, etc., etc. 

Thomas Guthrie, D.D., 1800 , is at present the most eloquent and popular 

preacher in the Free Church of Scotland. Dr. Guthrie was associated with Dr. Chal- 
mers in the disruption movement. Among his published works the one best known 
is The Gospel in Ezekiel. 

Rev. William nA>"XA, LL. D., 1S08 , a clergyman of the Free Church of Scot- 
land, is well known as the son-in-law and biographer of Dr. Chalmers. He was for 
some years editor of the Xorth British Review, and associate of Dr. Guthrie in St. 
John's Church, Edinburgh. He published Life of Chalmers, i vols. ; A Life of Christ, 
in 6 vols. 

Robert S. Caxdlish, D. D., , is a Scotch preacher of great eminence, and 

was one of the leaders in the disruption of the Scotch Church. He has published 
several works : Summary of the Question respecting the Church of Scotland ; Expo- 
sition of Genesis ; The Cross of Christ ; The Atonement ; The Resurrection ; Scrip- 
ture Characters, etc. 

Prof. Fairbairn. 

Patrick Fairbairx, D. J)., 1805 , is a theologian of high 

standing in the Free Church of Scotland. 

Prof. Fairbairn was born at Halyburton, Berwickshire, Scotland. He graduated 
at the University of Edinburgh, and in 1826 became a probationer of the Established 
Church of Scotland. From 1829 to 1837, he preached in the Orkney Islands. His 
secluded life in this remote settlement among fishermen gave him an amount of lei- 
sure for study which he would not have had in the busier work of an ordinary par- 
ish, and he then laid the foundation for those solid attainments which have given 
such rich fruits since. In 1837, he was called to a church in Glasgow ; and in 1840, 
to a church in East Lothian ; in 18-52 he became Assistant Professor, and then Pro- 
fessor, of Divinity in the Free Church College at Aberdeen ; and in 1856 wa-s trans- 
ferred to the Theological College at Glasgow. 

In 1867, Prof. Fairbairn was a delegate from the Free Church of Scotland to the 
Presbyterian Churches in America. His tall, commanding figure and his able addresses 
in the various ecclesiastical bodies to which he was presented, made a deep impression 
wherever he went. 

The following are his principal publications : The Typology of the Scriptures ; 
Prophecy Viewed in Respect to its Distinctive Nature ; New Testament Herraeneutics ; 
The Revelation of Law in the Scriptures ; A Commentary on Jonah, and also one on 
Ezekiel. He also translated Steiger on Peter, and wrote many articles for the Impe- 
rial Dictionary of the Bible, and for the North British and other reviews and maga- 
zines. Of all his works, The Typology of the Scriptures is considered the most im- 
portant. 



596 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

John Tulloch, D.D., 1823 , vrns born in Perthshire, Scothmd, and educated at 

St. Andrew's University. In 1854, he became Principal and Professor of Theology in 
St. Mary's College, St. Andrew's. Principal Tulloch spent some time in German}', and 
is intimately acquainted with the speculative theology of that country. He has been 
an active contributor to the British Quarterly and the North British Reviews. His 
other publications, all highly esteemed, are : Theological Tendencies of the Age ; 
Theism ; Leaders of the Reformation, Luther, Calvin, Latimer, Knox; English Puri- 
tanism and its Leaders, Cromwell, Milton, Baxter, Buiiyan ; Beginning Life, Chapters 
for Young Men ; The Christ of the Gospels and the Christ of Modern Criticism. 

John Eadie, D. D., LL. D., 1814 , Professor of Biblical Literature in the United 

Presbyterian Church, Glasgow, has published several popular works : Biblical Cyclo- 
pa?dia; A Condensed Concordance to the Scriptures; Life of Dr. Kitto ; Bible Dic- 
tionary for the Young; Lectures on the Bible, for the Young; Early Oriental History ; 
The Divine Love, a Series of Discourses, etc. 

Rev. Samuel Davidson, LL. D., 1808 , a Dissenting clergyman of the Irish 

Church, has acquired a high reputation as a biblical critic and commentator. Works : 
Introduction to the New Testament, 3 vols. ; Ecclesiastical Polity of the New Testa- 
ment ; Biblical Criticism, 2 vols. ; Sacred Hermeneutics, Developed and Applied ; 
Translation of Gieseler's Ecclesiastical History, 4 vols. 

Sunday-School Books. 

The growtli of religious fiction in the department of literature for 
the young has been prodigious. The impulse in this direction, first 
given by Mrs. Sherwood and others, early in the century, so far from 
spending itself, has gathered new force, and was never so great as at 
this time. 

The number of those who are engaged in this department of literature, chiefly 
ladies, is very great. A few only of the writers can be named. 

Mrs. Euzabeth Charles, formerly Miss Rundle, is the author of what are known 
as the Schonberg-Cotta books. She was the wife of Mr. Andrew Charles, a London mer- 
chant. She has no children, and has devoted herself to literature and active deeds 
of charity. Her husband died about three years ago. The first work of hers which 
attracted attention was the famous Chronicles of the Schonberg-Cotta Family. This 
purports to be a family record, kept by the inmates of a household with which Luther 
was familial', and presents the great Reformer and his fellow-actors as they might 
have appeared to an eye-witness. The conception is so perfect that the reader finds 
it difficult to believe that the work is not an original record made at the very time 
of the transactions described. The work was received with universal applause on 
both sides of the Atlantic. The author has followed it in rapid succession with a series 
of tales, mostly written in the same vein, and illustrating the Christian life in differ- 
ent ages of the church. The following is a list of her successive publications : The 
Early Dawn, or The Christian Life of England in the Olden Time ; Diary of Mrs. Kitty 
Trevylian, a Story of the Times of Whitefield and the Wesleys ; Winifred Bertram, a 
Story of Modern Life in London ; The Dray tons and The Davenants, a Story of tlie Civil 
War; On Both Sides of the Sea, a Story of the Commonwealth and the Restoration; 
The Cripple of Antioch ; Martyrs of Spain ; Tales and Sketches of Christian Life ; The 
Victory of the Vanquished ; Two Vocations ; Wanderings over Bible Lands ; Watch- 



MISCELLANEOUS. 597 

words for the Warfare of Life, from Dr. Martin Luther ; The Song without Words ; 
Mary the Handmaid of the Lord ; Poems. 

Some of these were published before her Schonberg-Cotta book, and now share in 
the celebrity of their common parentage. The sale of her books in the United States 
alone has reached nearly 200.000 volumes. 

Miss Anne Manning has written a large number of works in the style of the Schcin- 
berg-Cotta books, though not so exclusively religious in their intention. The one which 
first gained celebrity was The Maiden and Married Life of Mary Powell, the Wife of 
Milton. It purports to be a contemporary record by Mary Powell, giving an account 
of her courtship, marriage, repudiation, and reconcilement, and is the most perfect 
imitation of such a record ever attempted. The other books by the author, written 
in the same style, form a series, known as the Mary Powell Books. They are The 
Household of Sir Thomas More; Cherry and Violet, a Tale of the Great Plague; The 
Faire Gospeller, Mistress Anne Askew ; Jacques Bonnevel, or The Days of the Dragon- 
nades ; The Spanish Barber. 

The ' Mary Powell Books are among the most charming fictions to be found in the 
language. 

Mrs. Anne Shepherd, 1857, was a native of Cowes, Isle of Wight, and a daugh- 
ter of Rev. Edward Houlditch. She was the author of two religious novels, Ellen Sey- 
mour, and Reality, and of a volume of Hymns adapted to the Comprehension of Young 
Minds. One of these, which ought to make her name live in perpetual remembrance, 
is that beautiful hymn which has sent gladness to so many millions of young hearts : 
" Around tlie throne of God in heaven 
Thousands of children stand; 
Children whose sins are all forgiven, 

A holy, happy band. 
Singing glory, glory, glory. 
Glory be to God on high." 

A. L. 0. E. Books. One of the most prolific writers of Sunday-school books is a lady 
who veils her name under the initials A. L. 0. E. Her works alone make almost a 
library, — nearly fifty volumes, — and are among the best of their kind. 



VII. MISCELLANEOUS. 

The Howitts. 

William and Mary Howitt, with their sons and daughters, and 
some other members of the family, seem to form a group by themselves. 
Their writings and their doings have for some reason always been of 
special interest to Americans. A somewhat more extended notice of 
them, therefore, will be given than in the case of some others of equal 
celebrity. 

William Howitt, 1792 , was born of Quaker parentage, in Heanor, Dcrbj'sliire. 

His ancestors on both sides had lived for many generations in the same neighborhood. 
The pastoral and old world character of the district made a deep impression upon his 
boyish imagination, and have stamped themselves with a quaint individuality upon 
numerous pages of bis writings. He was educated at Ackworth, Yorkshire, the public 
seminary of the Society of Friends. His school-days past, he still devoted himself 
with unwearying enthusiasm to the study of languages, ancient and modern, as well 



598 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

as to Chemistry, Botany, Natural and Moral Philosophy. He wrote poetry as a school- 
boy, and from early life showed a marked predilection for rural sports. 

Mary Howitt, 1800 , was originally Mary Botham. She was married to Mr. 

Howitt in 1821. Like her husband, she came of " the stock of the martyrs." She was 
born amongst the iron forges of the Forest of Dean, in Gloucestershire, although her 
childhood and youth, until her marriage, were speut at the pleasantly situated little 
town of Uttoxeter, ia Staffordshire, where her fathei-'s family had ijossessed property 
for some generations. The similarity of tastes in literature and au enthusiastic love 
of the beauties of natural scenery, which has continued with William and Mary 
Howitt throughout their life, formed the basis of a friendship which ended in marriage, 
and has linked their names together in many volumes, both of prose and poetry, 
beloved of thousands throughout Great Britain and America. 

The first year of their married life was spent in Staffordshire. Their lirst appear- 
ance in print was in 1823, in a joint volume, The Forest Minstrel. This was followed, 
soon after, by Eyam and Other Poems. During this period also they became widely 
known by their contributions to the Annuals, which were just then beginning their 
career. 

Between 1831 and 1837, while living at Nottingham, "William Howitt published The 
Book of the Seasons; Pantika, or Traditions of the Most Ancient Times ; and A Pop- 
ular History of Priestcraft. Mary Howitt in the same period published her most im- 
portant poetical work. The Seven Temptations, a novel called "Wood Leighton, and her 
earliest volumes for the young, namely, Sketches of Natural History, and Tales in 
Prose and Verse. 

In 1837 Mr. Howitt quitted Nottingham, where he had been engaged in business, 
and settled with his family in the pleasant village of Esher, in Surrey, where both he 
and his wife devoted themselves exclusively to literary pursuits ; finding relaxation 
in the society of their children and of a few intimate friends, and in the enjoyment of 
their garden and of the beautiful surrounding country. During their three years' 
residence at Esher, "William Howitt produced, in rapid succession, some of his most 
popular works, — The Rural Life of England, Colonization and Christianity, the first 
series of Visits to Remarkable Places, and his first work for the young, The Boy's 
Country Book. Mary Howitt during the same time published two of her most popu- 
lar volumes of i)oetry for young people. Hymns and Fireside Verses, and Birds and 
Flowers ; also, several volumes of a series of short prose tales, entitled Tales for the 
People and their Children. 

From Esher the Howitts removed to Heidelberg, in Germany, partly for the educa- 
tion of their children, and partly also to perfect themselves in the German language 
and literature. During his residence in that country, "William Howitt wrote The 
Rural and Domestic Life of Germany, and German Experiences, and he translated a 
manuscript, written at his request by a German acquaintance, called The History of 
the Student-Life of Germany. Whilst residing at Heidelberg, "William and Mary 
Howitt were drawn to the study of the Swedish and Danish, and Mary Howitt was 
thus led to the translation of the works of Fredrika Bremer, — then just rising into 
fame, — and later to the translation of the earlier works of Hans Christian Andersen, 
both of which authors she first introduced to English and American readers. "William 
Howitt also wrote A History of Scandinavian Literature, a work of great research, 
illustrated with copious specimens from the poets, which were translated by Mary 
Howitt. 

In 1842 they returned to England, and took a residence in the immediate neighbor- 
hood of London. Here "William Howitt produced the second volume of his Visits to 
Remarkable Places, and another juvenile book. Jack of the Mill; whilst Mai-y Howitt 
was engaged in German and Scandinavian translations. She published also, about 



MISCELLANEOUS. 599 

this time, The Children's Year, a diary, l^ept for twelve months, of the lives of her 
younger children. Her object was to give to her youthful readers a story "every 
word of which should be true." She wrote afterwards another little book on the 
same plan. My Cousins in Ohio, giving the experiences of the children of her youngest 
sister, Mrs. Anderson of Cincinnati. Both volumes were at once popular. 

In 1846, the Howitts were occupied with the publication of The People's Journal, an 
advocate of social progress, and, on its faihu-e, undertook a periodical of their own, 
Howitt's Journal, of like character with the other, and with a like result. After 
laboring at the enterprise for two years, they retired from the field, wiser and sadder 
than when they went in. 

Their next publications were The History of Scandinavian Literature, — already 
mentioned, — Homes and Haunts of the Poets, Madam Dorrington of the Dene, and 
The Year-Book of the Country, by William Howitt ; and, by Mary Howitt, The Heir 
of Wast-Wayland, and several books for children, among which Mary Leeson and 
Steadfast Gabriel deserve especial notice. 

Upon the discovery of the gold-fields in Australia, William Howitt, accompanied by 
his two sons, set sail for Melbourne in 1852, being then in his sixtieth year. The 
fruits of his two years' sojourn in that colony are found in three works. Land, Labor, 
and Gold; Australian Boy's Book ; and a novel, Tallangetta. During the absence of 
her husband and her sons, Mrs. Howitt with her two daughters took up her residence 
in the pleasant London suburb of Highgate; and, assisted by her eldest daughter, 
Anna Mary, saw through the press several of her husband's works. She also com- 
piled A History of the United States, edited a juvenile magazine, The Dial of Love, 
wrote several juvenile books, and translated Miss Bremer's work on America. 

After Mr. Howitt's return fi'om Australia in 1854, he and his family continued to 
reside at Highgate until 1867. During this time, the literary industi-y of himself and 
his wife did not abate. Between the years 1856 and 1862, he wrote five and a half vol- 
umes of A Popular History of England, a work designed especially for the instruction 
of the people. The work was begun, and half of the first volume written by another 
pen, Mr. Howitt taking up the subject with the reign of Edward I., and bringing it 
down to the end of the reign of George III. It was followed by a political novel. The 
Man of the People, descriptive of the state of England half a century ago, and illus- 
trating the social principles advocated in his History and in many of his other writ- 
ings. 

In 1863, he published a work of great research. The History of the Supernatural ; 
and in 1805 another work of careful research, though relating to an entirely different 
subject. The History of the Discovery and Exploration of Australia, Tasmania, and 
New Zealand. He published in 18C3 a small volunie. Letters on Transportation as 
the Only Means of Effectual Convict Reform, and another, Letters on the Revolting 
Cruelties practised under the Game Laws, showing those laws to be the most prolific 
source of convictism. 

Mary Howitt meanwhile produced several new juvenile books, Mr. Bndd's Grand- 
children, Stories of Stapleford, and The Poet's Children. She also published in 1864 
a three-volume novel, The Cost of Caergwyn, the scene of which is laid in Wales. This 
novel, the result of a careful study of the scenery, people, legends, manners, and cus- 
toms of the Principality, contains probably the most delicate, accui-ate, and highly 
finished delineations of human character and of natural scenery which have come 
from the pen of this experienced writer. It was the result of several summers spent 
by her in Wales, where she had been greatly impressed by the local coloring and the 
peculiar characteristics both of the romantic scenery and of tlie ancient Celtic race. 

In 1865, Her Majesty Queen Victoria granted Williauk Howitt a pension from the 
Civil List, in acknowledgment of his and his wife's long and valuable literary services. 



600 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE MPOE AEIES . 

In 1867, William ancl Mary Ilowitt, with their daughter 3Iargaret, removed from 
Highgate to the place of their former residence, Esher, in Surrey, fifteen miles from 
London. Here William Howitt completed a work which, requiring much research, 
had occupied him more or less for two or three years, The Northern Heights of Lon- 
don. It may be regarded as a third volume of the " Visits to Remarkable Places." 

Mary Howitt meanwhile composed a series of simple, popular ballads, the subjects 
homely, but full of pathos and of a religious tendency, admirably adapted to touch 
the hearts of the laboring class. She also wrote at this time several ballads and short 
poems for the young ; a juvenile story, John Oriel's Start in Life ; and another juvenile 
volume, Our Four-footed Friends, a tale intended to cultivate in the young mihd a 
sympathy with the animal creation. A series of papers on Birds and their Nests 
inculcated the same sentiments. 

In 1870, the Howitts were enabled to gratify a long cherished wish of spending a 
season in Italy. The summer was given to Switzerland. While there, the Franco- 
Prussian war broke out, and William Howitt uttered an indignant protest against the 
alleged cruelties of the Prussians, in a Poem in blank verse. The Mad-War-Planet. 
Mary Howitt at the same time wrote a book, called A Pleasant Life, which is in fact a 
continuation of the story of " Mary Leeson," and contains a development of the 
author's ideas on education, mingled with experience of Swiss life and descriptions 
of Alpine scenery. The winter of 1870 and '71 was spent in Italy. 

William and Mary Howitt celebrated their Golden Wedding in Eome, April 16.1871, 
a large circle of friends, English, Americauv German, and French, gathering around 
them in kindly welcome. 

The summer of 1871 was spent by the Howitts in the mountain region of Austrian 
Tyrol, with the expectation of residing again in Rome in the winter of 1871-2. 

One of the noticeable things in the career of these two authors is the manner in 
which their lives, their works, their very names are blended in the popular estimate 
of them. Ebenezer Elliott, the Corn-Law Rhymer, expressed the idea, when he said 
their names always reminded him of a " William-andMary shilling," with their two 
heads side by side. Another noticeable feature in their career is the warm interest 
which their writings have always excited in the United States, — a tribute of respect 
which, from their own warm American sympathies, has been very gratifying to them. 

William Howitt, as his writings show, has been for many years an earnest advocate 
of what is called " Spiritualism." 

Early in their married life, William and Mary Howitt ceased to dress as Friends, or 
to conform to the other peculiarities of the Society-of which by birth and education 
they were members, and later in life they withdrew entirely from membership in the 
Society. But to the spirit of the writings, lives, and principles of the Friends they 
have always been firmly attached, and they have given a noble example of this 
spirit in their own beautiful lives. 

Anna Mary Howitt, the oldest daughter of William and Mary, is 
also a partaker of their literary and artistic tastes. 

She is favorably known to the public in the combined character of author and artist. 
Besides assisting her mother in various literary enterprises, she has published two 
works of her own which have been well received. An Art-Student in Munich, and The 
School of Life. In 1859, she was married to Mr. Alfred A. Watts, only son of the late 
Alaric A. Watts the poet, and an early friend of William and Mary Howitt. Mrs. 
Watts has sympathized entirely with her father, William Howitt, in his views on 
" Spiritualism," and has written much on IJie subject for the Spiritual Magazine. She 
and her husband also have contributed to this magazine a series of metaphysical 



MISCELLANEOUS. 601 

poems, which are published in a volume, under the title, Aurora, a volume of verse, 
by Husband and Wife. 

Margaret Howitt, tlie youngest daugliter, on tlie marriage of 
Anna Mary, succeeded to the pleasant office of assistant secretary to 
their niotlier. 

Margaret helped her mother particularly in collecting materials for the novel, The 
Cost oi Caergwyu. In lbGo-4, she spent a year in Sweden, in order to perfect herself 
in the knowledge or' the Scandinavian tongues. Here she was the guest of her 
mother's fi-ieud, Fredrika Bremer. On the death of Miss Bremer, Margaret Howitt 
published an interesting volume, Twelve Months with Fredrika Bremer, in Sweden. 
She has also translated from the Swedish, and published, both with and without her 
name, numerous articles for the magazines. 

EicHAED PIowiTT, 1799-1869, a brother of William, was settled 
for some years as a physician in Australia. 

He published, in 1845, as the result of his sojourn there, a volume entitled Impres- 
sions of Australia Felix, consisting of a charminglj' written diary, and of various 
poems suggested by the novel objects and scenery around him. He is also the author 
of three volumes of tasteful poetry, Antediluvian Sketches and Other Poems, The 
Gipsy King and Other Poems, and Wasp's Honey or Poetic Gold. 



Robert and \Villiam Cliambers. 

Egbert Chambers, 1802-1871, and William Chambers, 1800- 

, authors and publishers, of Edinburgh, are known and honored 

wherever English books are read, or the English language is spoken. 

By their sagacity and enterprise, these brothers have unaided accomplished what the 
vast and unwieldy Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge undertook, — they 
have made knowledge cheap in Great Britain, and they have diffused it as no other 
agency before ever did in that country. They began as booksellers, and, combining 
authorship with trade to an extent not usual, have had a wonderful success. Both in 
what they have written and in what they have published, their object has been to 
present those subjects which were of interest to the greatest number of readers, to 
make them attractive in style and form and easily understood, and at such a low rate 
of cost as to secure a large circulation. The idea, of course, has no novelty. Many 
have thought and tried the same thing. The peculiarity in the work of these men 
has been the sagacity and sound judgment which have marked all tlieir enterprises. 

The separate works written by Robert Chambers are : Traditions of Edinburgh ; 
Popular Rhymes of Scotland ; Pictures of Scotland ; History of the Scottish Rebellion ; 
Life of James I. ; Scottish Ballads and Songs; Biographical Dictionary of Eminent 
Scotsmen. He was also the principal editor of the Encyclopaedia of English Literature. 
The separate works of William Chambers are: The Book of Scotland; Things as they 
are in America; A Tour in Holland; Peebles and its Neighborhood; Improved Dwell- 
ing-House for the Humble, etc. 

The brothers jointly in 1832 began the Edinburgh (weekly) Journal, which was 
their first great success. It obtained almost immediately a circulation of 50,000, which 
61 



602 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTE MPOE AEIES . 

was increased afterwards to 90,000. This was followed by The People's Edition of 
Standard English Authors ; Chambers's Miscellany ; Cliambers's Educational Course ; 
Papers for the People, etc. Then came the Encyclopsedia of English Literature : En- 
cyclopgedia for the People ; Information for the People; the Book of Days, etc. 

The sales of these various publications have been enormous. In connection with 
this, it should be said that tlie works which they have thus spread so. widely are of a 
kind to do good. There is not probably a line in all that they have sent forth to the 
world which a good man would desire to expunge, while the manifest tendency of 
it all has been to elevate the moral and intellectual character of the i-eaders. 

Charles Knight, 1791 , a native of Windsor, is distinguished as an editor and 

a publisher. The most prominent of his publications are Knight's Quarterly ; the 
Penny Cyclopaedia, afterwards recast and enlarged into the English Cyclopaedia; The 
Pictorial Shakespeare; and The Popular History of England. Knight was one of the 
first members of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, and, as such, 
published, at his own risk, The Penny Magazine, and The Library of Entertaining 
Knowledge. 

Rev. George Gilfillan, 1813 , was bom at Comrie, Perthshire, Scotland. He 

was educated partly at Glasgow College, and partly at the United Secession Hall. He 
has been a very voluminous writer, but has been more ambitious of quantity in his 
productions than of quality. A dangerous facility of expression, unrestrained by a 
severe taste, has led him too often into what certainly approaches bombast. " He is 
sometimes happy in his metaphors, and apt in his fillusions, but is more likely to be 
extravagant in the one and grotesque in the other." — AlUbone. His publications are : 
Gallery of Literary Portraits, in Three Series or Parts ; The Bards of the Bible ; The 
Martyrs, Heroes, and Baids of the Scottish Covenant; The Grand Discovery; The 
History of a Man ; The Book of British Poesy. Mr. Giliillan also has edited a uni- 
form library edition of the British poets, extending to a large number of volumes. 

Tapper. 

Martin Faequhae, Tuppee,, 1810 , had for a time a very liigli 

repute as an author, but has now fallen into general neglect. 

Mr. Tupper studied at the Charter-House School and at Oxford, and entered upon 
the profession of the law. This he soon relinquished for the more congenial and 
lucrative vocation of letters. 

If success is to be gauged by financial profits and the niimber of volumes sold, Mr. 
Tupper is the most successful writer of his generation. The almost incredible state- 
ment has been made, that up to 1863 500,000 copies of the Proverbial Philosophy had 
been sold in America alone. Future generations will have hard work in believing that 
the same American public that devoured such an immense amount of farrago was 
letting Hawthorne struggle painfully into acknowledged existence. 

Besides the Proverbial Philosophy, Mr. Tupper has published along series of works 
of equal merit, some in prose, others in verse. Among his novels may be signalized 
The Crock of Gold, The Twins, Stephen Langton, a romance of the days of King John. 
His poetry is chiefly in the form of ballad, sonnet, and ode, and comprises a number 
of collections. He has even had the temerity to compose a poem entitled Geraldine, 
a sequel to Coleridge's Christabel, and an Ode to Shakespeare on the occasion of the 
tercentenary annivei'sary of the great drapiatist's birth. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 603 

In stj'le, Mr. Tupper is eccentric and yet prosy, and in matter commonplace. 
There is nothing exceptionable in what he saj's. On the contrarj^ it is good, sound 
doctrine ; but the milk is so diluted as to be unfit even for babes. For years Mr. 
Tupper was the standing butt of the Londtm press ; but as he appears to be withdraw- 
ing from the arena of publication, it is to be hoped that the vacancy thus created may 
not speedily be refilled. 

Gleig. 

Eev. George E. Gleiq, 1795 , is one of tke most prolific 

writers of the day. 

Mr. Gleig is a clergyman of the Church of England, and a sou of Bishop Gleig. He 
was educated at Oxford, and at first entered the army. He served in the Peninsula, 
and afterwards in the United States, and was wounded at the capture of Washington. 
Subsequently he took orders, and, in 1846, he was appointed Chaplain-General; he 
also devised a scheme for the education of soldiers, and was made Inspector-General 
of the military schools. He has been extremely busy with his pen. 

The following are his principal works: The Subaltern; Allan Breck, 3 vols.; 
County Courts, 2 vols.; ChronicleS of Waltham, 3 vols.; The Hussar, 2 vols.; The 
Only Daughter, 3 vols. ; The Light Dragoon, 2 vols. ; Soldier's Help to Divine Truth ; 
Guide to the Lord's Supper; Sermons for Advent, Christmas, and the Epiphany; His- 
tory of the Bible, 2 vols., 8vo ; British Militai'y Commanders, 3 vols.; History of 
British India, 4 vols.; Family History of England, 3 vols.; Traditions of Chelsea 
College, 3 vols.; Visit to Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, 3 vols.; Veterans of 
Chelsea Hospital, 3 vols. ; Sale's Brigade in Afghanistan : Story of the Battle of 
"Waterloo ; Campaigns of the British Army at Vrashington and New Orleans ; Life of 
Sir Thomas Munro, 3 vols. ; Life of Lord Clive ; Life of Warren Hastings, 3 vols. 

This list, which is still not complete, shows how very industrious Mr. Gleig must 
have been. Most of his writings, too, have been popular, and have deserved the fame 
which they received. But some of his books show signs of mere hack work, — done 
to order, and not for the assertion of truth. The book last named brought upon him 
a terrible castigation from the pen of Macaulay. 

Harriet Martineau. 

Harriet Martineau, 1802 , a native of Norwich, and a de- 
scendant of a Huguenot family, has been a most prolific writer, on a 
wide range of subjects, from theology and positi"\dsm to sketches of 
travel. 

Miss Marti neau's earliest work was Devotional Exercises for the Young. This 
was followed by a series of popular tales, such as Christmas Day, The Rioters, Mary 
Campbell, &c. Miss Martineau visited the United States in 1835, and published, on 
her return to England, Society in America, and Retrospect of Western Travel. These 
were followed by other novels and stories, Deerbrook, The Hour and the Man, etc., an 
Introduction to the History of England during the Thirty Years' Peace, an abridged 
and free translation of Comte's Positivism, and many other miscellaneous works, as 
well as contributions to the English reviews and magazines. 

Miss Martineau's writings are pleasant, her style is livelj', almost piquant. She is, 
however, by no means accurate in statement or logical in reasoning, as is abundantly 
shown by her sketches of America. 



604 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

James M.^tineatj, 1805 , brother of Harriet Martineau (a prominent Unitarian 

minister, and Professor of Philosophy in Manchester New College, London), is the 
author of several works of note, among which are Endeavors after Christian Life, 
Rationale of Religious Inquiry, and Lectures in defence of Unitarianism. lu the- 
ology, Mr. Martineau may be called an orthodox Unitarian, holding the middle 
ground between Trinitariauism and the radical party. 

Mrs. Fanny Kemble. 

Frances Anne Ke^eble, 1811 , distinguished in early life as 

an actress, acquired still greater distinction aiterwards by her Shake- 
speare Readings. 

She was the daughter of the tragedian Charles Kemble, was born in London, and 
accompanied her father, in 1832, to the United States, where she was married to Pierce 
Butler. In 1849, she was divorced, and since that time has resumed her family 
name, being commonly known as Mrs. Fanny Kemble. 

In addition to her histrionic talents, Mrs. Kemble is well known as an author. In 
1832, she published Francis the First, an Historical Drama, written when she was 
only seventeen. In 1835, appeared her Journal of Travels in the United States; in 
1837, The Star of Seville, a Dnuna ; in ISH, a volume of Poems ; and, in 1847, a Year 
of Consolation, descriptive of a tour through France and of a sojourn at Rome. 

All Mrs. Kemble's writings evince vigor of thought and quickness of observation. 
Her Journal, when it first appeared, was severely criticized in England, as being in 
bad taste. The Poems have been highly praised in all quai'ters. 

Mrs. Ellis. 

Mrs. Sarah (Stickney) Ellis, 1812 , wife of the well-known 

missionary, Eev. William Ellis, has done for her generation a work 
similar in some respects to that done by Hannah More and by Maria 
Edgeworth in their days. 

Her writings, like theirs, have had a higher aim than mere amusement; they are 
educational, in the broadest and best sense of the word. The principal works of Mrs. 
Ellis are : The Women of England ; The Daughters of England ; The Wives of Eng- 
land ; Family Secrets ; Pictures of Private Life ; The Poetry of Life ; Conversations 
on Human Nature ; Home, or The Iron Rule ; Temper and Temperament ; Preven- 
tion Better than Cure; Random Hours, or Hints on the Formation of Character; 
Social Distinction, or Hearts and Homes ; My Brother, or The Man of Many Friends ; 
Look to the End, or The Barnetts Abroad ; Fireside Tales ; Summer and Winter in 
the Pyrenees; A Yoice from the Tintage; Sons of the Soil, a Poem; The Island 
Queen, a Poem, etc. These various works of Mrs. Ellis fill over 30 vols. 

"It is a comfort to think that in all things we are not retrograding. The talents 
which made Hannah More and Madame D'Arblay the idols of the literary world in 
their generation, would now secure them but a slender share of homage. The culti- 
vation of the female mind has certainly advanced ; and we greatly doubt if any woman 
of the last century could have written the Wives of England." — British Magazine. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 605 

Crabb Robinson. 

Hexey Crabb Eobixsox, 1775-1S67, is known almost exclusively 
hj his memoirs, published after his death, under the title, Henry 
Crabb Eobinson's Diary, Eemioiscences, and Correspondence. 

This work is one of the most interesting in the English language, for it is nothing 
less than a personal record of men and things, kept by one who Avas for seventy years 
intimately associated with the leading men and women of England. France, and 
Germany. 

Mr. Robinson studied-for five years in Germany, serving for a while as correspond- 
ent for the London Times. He also accompanied Sir John More's Cornnna expedition 
in the same capacitj-. When upwards of thirty, he was admitted to the bar, and in the 
coui-se of time was in the possession of a lucrative practice, from which he retired in 
1828, to enjoy forty years uf complete social and literary leisure. 

"While a young man iu Germany, Eobinson became acquainted with Goethe, Schiller, 
Madame de Stael, the Brentanos, Schlc-gel. Knibel, Wieland, and a host of others, 
then risen or rapidly rising into fame. He thus became the instnmient, on his return, 
of presenting the claims of German literature to his countrymen. It would be im- 
possible to enumerate here all the names that figure in Eobinson's pages. He was 
very intimate \iith. Lamb, the Wordsworths, Elaxman, Coleridge, Arnold, Bunsen, in 
fact, neaidy all the literati and artists of the century, nut ro mention the magnates of 
the legal profession. 

The diarist seems to have gone everywhere and seen every one. Without possessing 
literary abilities of his own, he was capable of sympathizing with and appreciating 
talent in others, while his genial manner and powers of conversation procured him a 
welcome in every house and made his own social entertainments, his well-known 
breakfasts, the most thoroughly agreeable of their kind in London, not even inferior 
to those of Rogers. 

His Diary has no especial merits of style. It is a plain straightforward narrative, 
interspersed with bits of criticism or reflection. The great charm of the work consists 
in its simplicity approaching almost to naivete, and its value consists in the picture 
which it presents of the growth of English society and letters. He who wishes to 
have a continuous, life-like presentment of the entire nineteenth century up to 1S65, 
cannot do better than read this stupendous record, for such it really is. Not to every 
man is it given to live to the age of fourscore and ten with unimpaired faculties, 
mingling with the wisest and wittiest of three generations, and embodying the most 
pleasant experiences in an unbroken narrative. 

The Brothers Mayhew. 

The Brothers ^Iayhew ('Henry, Horace, Augustus, Thomas, and 
Edward), natives of London, have made valuable contributions to 
popular literature. 

Henry Maijhew, 1812 , was one of the foundere of The London Punch, and tlie 

author of several works, partly humorous, partly serious. The best known are Tlie 
Adventures of Mr. and Mrs. Sandboys; The Story of the Peasant-Boy Philosopher, 
founded upon the Life of James Ferguson. But Henrj* Mayhew's greatest work l>y 
far is his London Labor and the London Poor. This is a faithful and minute portrait- 
ure of the highways and byways of the metropolis, with its swarming dens, its motley 
lower classes and their shifts for a living, their vices and their virtues. Both to the 
51* 



606 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

ordinary reader and to the political economist, London Labor is a wonderfully suggestive 
book. The Great World of London is in some sense a continuation of London Labor. — 
Horace Mayhew has been a contributor to Punch. His most popular works are : Model 
Men and Women, Change for a Shilling, Letters Left at the Pastry Cooks. In connec- 
tion with his brother Augustus he also published a series of comic sketches, prominent 
among which are The Greatest Plague in Life, The Image of his Father, etc. — Augustus 
Mayhew Avas associated with Horace in the publication of a series of comic stories. 
He is also the author of Paved with Gold, an Unfashionable Novel. — Tlionias Mayhew 
signalized himself by starting the Penny National Library, a series of books on all 
subjects, sold at a penny a volume. Mr. Mayhew was also editor of The Poor Man's 
Guardian, and contributor to many periodicals. — Edward Mayhew is author of several 
treatises upon the horse and the dog. 

Alexander Mackat, , is a native of Scotland and a prominent writer for 

the (London) Morning Chronicle. Mr. Mackay is best known to the American reader 
by his Western W^orld, a three-volume work of travels in the United States, published 
in 1849. Tills work was favorably received both in England and in America, and was 
the best of its kind that had appeared up to that time, 

George Augustus Sala, 1827 , the son of a Portuguese father and a Creole 

mother, has contributed voluminously to English periodicals and has travelled exten- 
sively. Since 1860 Mr. Sala has been editor of Temple Bar, a London magazine. 
Among his many works the most prominent perhaps are Ye Belle Alliance, a panto- 
mime; A Journey in the North (Russia); The Baddington Peerage ; Dutch Pictures ; 
The Two Prima Donnas; Quite Alone, etc., etc. 

Mr. Sala has contributed several pieces to Household Words. In 1865 he published 
two volumes of travels, entitled My Diary in America, giving an account of his adven- 
tures as War Correspondent of the Daily Telegraph during the war in 1863-4. He has 
published recently Rome, Venice, and Other Wanderings, and Charles Lamb's Complete 
Works and Correspondence, with an Essay on Lamb's Genius. Mr. Sala is a very 
lively, entertaining writer, and a correspondent of the W.-H.-Russell order, although 
not ecjual to the latter. 

Albert Smith. 

Albert Smith, 1816-1860, was an attractive and popular humor- 
ous writer of his day. 

His earliest sketch of note was his Jasper Buddie, or Confessions of a Dissecting- 
Room Porter. His contributions to Punch and other periodicals were very numerous. 
Among them are the Physiology of Evening Parties, The Natural History of the 
Gent, Stuck-up People, etc. Smith obtained his chief reputation, however, by his 
public entertainments, in which he accompanied his panoramic representations with 
a running commentary of wit and clever description. The first of these exhibitions, 
called The Overland Mail, was soon followed by The Ascent of Mont Blanc. This was 
the delight of many thousand audiences in England and America for several years, 
and was repeated for the last time only a day or two before Smith's death. His China 
was also successful, but not to the same degree. 

George Walter Thornbury, 1828 — — , has been a prolific mis- 
cellaneous writer. 

His works may be arranged, somewhat loosely, into three groups — novels, bio- 
graphical notices, and sketches of travel. Among the novels are the Buccaneers (the 



MISCELLANEOUS. 607 

earliest), True as Steel, Wildfire, Tales for the Marines, and Great Heart. Among the 
biographical and historical sketches are, Shakespeare's England, the Life of J. M. W. 
Turner (v.hich \vas sharply criticized by the Athenasumj, and British Artists from 
Hogarth to Turner. His works of travel include Art and Nature at Home and Abroad, 
Life in Spain Past and Present, Turkish Life and Character, etc. Besides these, Mr. 
Thornbury has published a volume of Songs of the Cavaliers and Round Heads, and 
Two Centuries of Song, and translated La Fontaine's Fables into English verse, 
and also the legend of the Wandering Jew. His style is lively and entertaining, and 
his novels have the merit of healthy feeling and naturalness of character and incident. 

Thomas B. Shaw, 1813-1862, was born in London, and educated at Cambridge. He 
was appointed Professor of English Literature in the Imperial Lyceum, St. Petersburg, 
in 1842, Lector in the University of St. Petersbui-g in 1851, and Tutor of English to the 
Grand Dukes of Russia from 1853 to 1862. His chief work was Outlines of English 
Literature, being the substance of his course of lectures in the Lyceum and the Uni- 
versity. 

Ret. Andrew K. H. Botd, 1825 , is a Scotch minister and a popular writer on 

religious and moral subjects. His works have been reprinted in this country, and 
have been received with general favor: Recreations of a Country Parson ; Graver 
Thoughts; Leisure Houi's ; Every-Day Philosopher; Counsel and Comfort; Autumn 
Holidays. 

Rev. Peter Batxe, , a Scotch clergyman, has attained considerable celeb- 
rity by his critical articles on literary subjects and also by his religious writings, all 
of which have displayed talent of a high order. His published volumes are Essays in 
Biographical Criticism, Sermons, The Christian Life, Social and Individual. '• These 
volumes indicate the traits of mind and heart which render the Christian Life so 
intensely suggestive and vitalizing, and at the same time they display a critical power 
seldom equalled in comprehensiveness, depth of insight, candid appreciation, and judi- 
cial integrity." — JS^. Am. Review. 

JoHx Browx, M. D., 1810 , of Edinburgh, was educated at the High-School and 

the University of that city. He has been a contributor to the North British Review 
and to Good Words. He published two volumes of Essays, on professional and other 
subjects, entitled Horas Subsecivse. One of these pieces, called Rub and His friends, 
giving an account of a favorite dog, has been very popular. 

Sir Rouxdell Palmer, M. P., 1812 , was educated at Rugby and at Oxford. He 

entered Parliament in 1847, and is one of the ablest debaters in the Liberal party. He 
was made Solicitor-General in 1861, and was Attorney-General from 1863 to 1866. He 
is a man of fine literary culture, and has published a work of great excellence, The 
Book of Praise, from the Best English Hymn Wi-iters, which has had a large sale. 

James Pillaxs, 1778-1864, was a native of Edinburgh, and a contemporary with 
Brougham and Francis Horner in the Edinburgh High-School. He was subsequently 
Principal of the School, and was Professor of Humanity in the Edinburgh University, 
from 1820 to 1863. His publications have been chiefly on educational subjects: Three 
Lectures on the Proper Objects and Methods of Education; Letters on Elementary 
Teaching; Rationale of Di.scipline as exemplified in the Edinburgh High-School ; Con- 
tributions to the Cause of Education, etc. 

Joseph Angus, D.D., 1816 , is the author of several excellent manuals: Bible 

Hand-Book, Hand-Book of the English Language; Hand-Book of English Literature; 
Hand-Book of Extracts from English Authors; Christ our Life; Prize Essay on the 
Voluntary System ; and Sermons. His Hand-Books are exceedingly valuable. Dr. 



608 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Angus was born at Bolam, Xorthwmberland, and educated at King's College, Stepney- 
College, and Edinburgh. He is a prominent writer and preacber among the Baptists. 
He was made Secretary of the Baptist Missionary Society in 1840, and President of 
Stepney College in 1849. He has been for several years English Examiner in the 
"University of London, and in the Indian Civil Service. 

Mks. Mart Cowden Clarke, 1809 , has connected herself indissolubly with the 

works of Shakespeare, by the prejjaratiou of a Complete Concordance of his Plays. 
This work occupied her for sixteen years, and is the most perfect work of the kind to 
be found. Besides this, Mrs. Clarke has written The Iron Cousin, an excellent novel ; 
Girlhood of Shakespeare's Heroines ; Shakespeare's Proverbs ; "World-Noted "Women, etc. 

George Oliver, D. D., 1782-1867, was especially distinguished as 
a writer on Freemasonry. 

His various publications on that subject number nearly thirty volumes, and are 
favorite works with the brethren of the order. The following are the titles of a few: 
Dictionary of Symbolic Masonry ; Symbol of Glory, showing the Object and End of 
Masonry; The Antiquities of Freemasonry ; An Apology for Preemasonry ; Theocratic 
Philosophy of Freemasonry ; Origin of the Royal Arch Degree ; Insignia of the Royal 
Arch Degree ; Ornaments, Fui-niture, and Jewels ; Account of the Masonic schism of 
the Last Century ; Mirror for the.Iohannite Masons, etc. Besides his Masonic writings, 
Dr. Oliver has published numerous antiquarian works : Historic Collections relative 
to the Monasteries in Devon ; History of Antiquities of Beverly; Monumental Anti- 
quities of Grimsby; Existing Remains of the Ancient Britons, etc. 

Writers on Architecture. 

The subject of Architecture has given birth to a literature of its 
own. Two only of the writers on this subject can be named. 

Augustus Welby Pugin, 1811-1852, a son of the eminent architect, Augustus Pugin, 
gained applause at an early age by his skill in architectural design. He obtained 
eminence, not only as an architect, but as a writer on aixhitecture, and was especially 
noted for his devotion to the Gothic and mediaeval styles of building and ornament. 
He became a convert to the Catholic Church, and was a zealous advocate of its rites 
and ceremonies. The following are some of his M'orks : True Principles of Pointed or 
Christian Architecture ; An Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in 
England ; Glossary of Ecclesiastical Ornament and Costume ; The Present State of 
Public "Worship among the Roman Catholics ; Contrasts, or a Parallel between the 
Noble Edifices of the Fourteenth and Fifteentli CSnturies and Similar Buildings of the 
Present Day, showing the Decay of Taste. It was of this work that one of the re- 
viewers remarked that Pugin told '■ the bluntest and most disagreeable truths in the 
bluntest possible manner." The artist's criticisms, however, though irritating, were 
generally acquiesced in, and wrought a great change in the public taste. 

James Fergusson, 1808 , is celebrated both as an architect and a writer on 

architecture. He is a native of Scotland. He spent several years in India and China. 
He advocated a new theory of fortifications and earthworks. His plans were much 
ridiculed at the time, but the siege of Sebastopol showed that in many of his ideas 
he was right. His chief works are : Illustrated Hand-book of Architecture ; The 
Peril of Portsmouth, or French Fleets and English Forts ; The Ancient Topography 
of Jerusalem ; Picturesque Illustrations of Ancient Architecture in Hindostan ; The 
Palaces of Nineveh and Persepolls Restored. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 609 



Richardson. 

Charles Eichardson, LL. T)., 1775-1865, is well known as tlie 
autlior of A New Dictionary of tke English Language. 

Dr. Richardson, in the earlier part of his life, gave some attention to legal studies, 
but afterwards devoted himself almost exclusively to philological pursuits. From 1852 
to 1865 he was in the receipt of a pension of £75 from the Government. 

His first publication was Illustrations of English Philology,1815. It consisted mainly 
of criticisms on Johnson's Dictionary, and an advocacy of the principles of lexicog- 
raphy advanced by Home Tooke. He was next engaged to prepare A Dictionary of the 
English Language for the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana, and his great work appeared 
originally in this form, namely, as a part of the Encyclopaedia. It was published 
afterwards as a separate work, first in numbers, and then, in 1837, in 2 vols., 4to. 
This work, which the author very properly calls A JVeiv Dictionary of the English 
Language, constitutes his claim to an enduring place in English literature. . 

The Dictionary of Richardson is altogether unique. The other Dictionaries that we 
have are built up by accretion one upon another, or have been developed one from 
another — Webster from Johnson, Johnson from Bailey, and so on, going back to 
Edward Philips's little book. The New World of Words. But Richardson struck out 
boldly into a new path. He adopted as a cardinal principle the dictum of Home 
Tooke, that each word has inherently but one meaning, and this one primary meaning 
must first be ascertained, not by arbitrary conjecture, but by etymological and his- 
torical research ; and that all the secondary and derived meanings should be subordi- 
nated to it, and be shown to spring from it, in historical and logical order. Another 
feature of his work, equally prominent, is his accumulation of quotations under each 
vFord or family of words, showing its use in successive periods, giving in fact the ma- 
terials for a history of the word. 

lUchardson's work is so incomplete that it can never supply the place of a diction- 
ary for general use. Yet it is so rich in materials that no literary or professional man 
can well do without it. The cardinal principles upon which it is based are the true 
foundations of the science of lexicography, and if ever a general and comprehensive 
English dictionary shall be framed, in which these principles shall be fully carried 
out, it will constitute an era in English lexicography. 

John Mitchell Kemble, 1807-1857, stands in the foremost rank 
of Anglo-Saxon philologists. 

Mr. Kemble is the son of Charles Kemble and only brother of Mrs. Fanny Kemble. 
He was educated at Cambridge, and studied afterwards in Germany under Jacob 
Grimm. The most prominent of his publications are his editions of the Poems of 
Beowulf, of the Saxon Charters, and of the State Papers and Correspondence on the 
State of Europe from the Revolution to the Accession of the House of Hanover. For 
a number of years he was also editor of the Bi-itish and Foreign Quarterly. His 
most popular work is The Saxons in England, A History of the English Common- 
wealth until the Norman Conquest, left unfinished. 

John Conington, 1825-1869, Professor of Latin in the University of Oxford, by his 
profound scholarship, seemed about to bring back the times of Porson and Beiitloy. 
His early death, on the threshold of a career that promised so much, was a source of 
general regret. 

20 



610 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Conington was born at Boston, and educated at Rugby, under Arnold and Tait, and 
at Oxford. His career, both at school and at the University, was a succession of tri- 
umphs. At the close of his undergraduate career, he was elected Fellow of Univer- 
sity College. He was elected in lS5-t to the newly created University Professorship of 
Latin, which chair he held until his death. His first publication of any note was a 
translation of the Agamemnon of ^schylus into English verse, in 1848. The Choe- 
phorge of JEschylus, with Notes, appeared in 1857. The Woi-ks of Virgil with an 
English Commentary was completed in 1863. The Odes and the Carmen Seculare of 
Horace, translated into English verse, appeared in 1863; and the ^neid of Virgil, 
translated into English verse, in 1866. Professor Conington's translations won gene- 
ral applause from critics, not only by the masterly scholarship which they exhibited, 
but by the ease and elegance of his English, and his wonderfully delicate appreciation 
of rhythm. 

Benjamin Jowett, 1817 , Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Oxford, 

was born at Camberwell, and educated at St. Paul's School and at Oxford. He was 
appointed tutor of Balliol College in 1S42, and Greek Professor in 1855. Prof. Jowett 
has written a Commentary on the Epistles to the Romans, Galatians, and Thessaloni- 
ans, and is one of the authors of the volume of "Essays and Reviews," having con- 
tributed to it the essay on The Interpretation of Scripture. His greatest literary work, 
however, is his Translation of Plato, which has obtained at once general acceptance. 

Smith's Dictionaries. 

W1LI.IAM Smith, LL. D., 1814 , is known to ail scholars bj his 

Classical and Bible Dictionaries. 

Dr. Smith is a native of London, and a graduate of its University, where he took 
high honors. After commencing the study of the law, he abandoned it for philology. 
He has occupied several professional positions, and he became editor of Murray's Quar- 
terly in 1867. Dr. Smith is perhaps the most widely known of all English classical 
scholars of the present day. Those who have been benefited by his labors may be 
counted by hundreds of thousands. His most celebrated works are the Dictionary of 
Greek and Roman Antiquities, the Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and 
Mythology, and the Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. These six large 
volumes, in the latest edition, constitute the most valuable contribution ever made in 
English to the classical student's working-library, and completely supersede all other 
works of the kind. The list of writers for these volumes would embrace nearly all 
that are distinguished in England for classical attainments. 

Next in importance to these is Smith's Latin-English Dictionary, an admirable work, 
based upon those of Freund and Forcellini. 

Dr. Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, in three volumes, stands also at the head of 
works of its kind, covering the entire ground of biblical lore. 

In addition to these larger works, Dr. Smith has published a number of minor works, 
among them some classical authors, but consisting chiefly of condensed historical 
manuals, such as the smaller Histories of Greece and Rome, The Student's Gibbon, 
The Student's Hume, The History of France, The Old Testament History, and The New 
Testament History, etc. 

The mere list of works of such magnitude and excellence is enough to fill the lover 
of sound learning with admiration for the editor, who has displayed in them the 
greatest zeal, and also the greatest skill in availing himself of the resources of his 
numerous contributors and coadjutors. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 611 



Travels. 

The literature of Travel at the present day is very abundant and 
valuable. A few only of this class of writers can be named. 

Sir William Edward Parry, Eear Admiral R. N., 1790-1855, is well known as an 
Arctic explorer. Admiral, then Captain, Parry made, between 1819 and 1828, four 
Yoyages to the Arctic regions, by which his name has been rendered famous. His 
attempts to reach the North Pole, like those of so many others, were failures ; but he 
had the merit of familiarizing the navies of England and America with the perils of 
Arctic navigation, and of arousing a spirit of generous emulation. An edition of his 
four voyages was published in 1828. 

Sir John Ross, 1777-1856, Rear-Admiral in the British navy, is well known as an 
Arctic explorer, at first under Parry and afterwards in command. His Arctic voyages 
were three in number, of which the last, made in 1850, was in search of Sir John 
Franklin. He has published separate accounts of all these voyages, as well as several 
other treatises on Arctic explorations. These works are full of interesting informa- 
tion, but have not that charm of style which belongs to Dr. Kane's celebrated nar- 
rative. 

William Scoresbt,1790-T857, son of the celebrated Arctic navigator of the same name, 
and a clergyman of the Church of England, is author of numerous works, chiefly de- 
scriptive of the Arctic regions. The chief of them are : An Account of the Arctic 
Regions ; Journal of a Voyage to the North Whale Fishery ; Magnetical Observations, 
in three parts ; Memorials of the Sea, in which is contained a full account of the ad- 
ventures of his father; and, finally, a Journal of a Voyage Around the World for Mag- 
netic Research. Young Scoresby accompanied his father for a number of years in his 
Arctic explorations, and succeeded him in the command of The Resolution, but took 
holy orders in 1825. In addition to these works, Mr. Scoresby contributed a number 
of papers to the reports of various scientific associations. 

Charles August Murray, 1806 , son of the Earl of Dunmore, has travelled ex- 
tensively, in a diplomatic capacity, in the East, and also in America. As an author he 
is known by his Travels in North America and a Summer Residence with the Pawnee 
Tribe, etc., a work of travels in two volumes. This has been highly commended, as writ- 
ten in a lively, almost genial manner, and quite free from prejudice. Murray has also 
published two novels, The Prairie Bird, a tale of Indian life, and The Child of the 
Pyramid, an Egyptian Tale. 

Richard Robert Madden, M. D., 1798 , a native of Ireland, has travelled exten- 
sively, and given to the world a number of volumes of travels and history. The best 
known of his travels are perhaps: Travels in Turkey, Egypt, Palestine, etc. He also 
published an account of The United Irishmen of 1798, and The Infirmities of Genius. 
The work of greatest permanent value, however, is his Memoirs and Correspondence 
of the Countess of Blessington, in 3 vols. 

Austin Henry Layard, D.C.L., 1817 , of English family, but born in Paris, is 

one of the most distinguished'travellers of the ijrosent century. Mr. Layard has held 
several offices under the British Government, and was appointed, 1S69, Ambassador to 
Spain. He was the discoverer of the buried remains of Nineveh. His principal works 
are: Nineveh and its Remains, 2 vols., Svo ; Tlie :\I(inume!its of Nineveh; Fresh Dis- 
coveries at Nineveh and Piesearches at Biiliyloii ; Illustrations of the Vases, etc., at 
Nineveh. The publication of these volumes of discoveries marked a new era in 
archaeology, — the revelation of a long-lust world. Tlie effect of Mr. Layard's success- 
ful labors was increased by the able manner in which they were presented to the pub- 
lic. The style of the narrative is simple, vigorous, and perfectly unaffected. 



612 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Sir Francis Bond Head, 1793 , formerly Major in the roj'al army, and Lieuten- 
ant-Governor of Upper Canada, 1835-8, retired on a pension. Head has written a 
number of books, descriptive in their nature : Rough Notes of Rapid Journeys across 
the Pampas, etc., vrhich earned for him the sobriquet of " Galloping Head ; " Bubbles 
from the Brunnen of Nassau ; Narrative of his Administration ; Stokers and Pokers, a 
Description of the Daily Workings of a Great Railway; The Defenceless State of Great 
Britain ; Fortnight in Ireland ; Fagot of French Sticks. The style of Head's writing 
is lively and entertaining, but strongly marked with egotism, and not always to be 
trusted for its accuracy of statement. — Sir George Head, brother of Sir Francis, 1782- 
1855. Like his brother, he published a number of descriptive works, such as : Forest 
Scenes in the Wilds of North America ; Home Tour through the Manufacturing Dis- 
tricts of England; Rome; a Tour of Many Days; a Translation of Cardinal Pacca's 
Memoirs; and of Apulejus's Metamorphoses. His book on Rome, in 3 vols., 8vo, is 
almost exhaustive of the wonders of the Eternal City. 

Sir James Edward Alexander, 1803 , a native of Scotland and an officer of the 

British army, and a traveller of much celebrity, has written several valuable works, 
chiefly travels. Sir James is a descendant of the old Earls of Stirling. He was edu- 
cated at Edinburgh and Glasgow. He has been in active service for nearly half a 
century, in various parts of Asia and Africa and in North America. He was knighted 
for his services in African exploration in 1836-7. The following are his principal 
works : Excursions in Western Africa ; An Expedition into Southern Africa; Explo- 
rations in British America; Sketches in Portugal; Transatlantic Sketches; Travels 
Irom India to England ; Travels through Russia and the Crimea ; Life of the Duke of 
Wellington; Translations from the Persian, etc. 

Thomas Witlam Atkinson, 1799-1861, an English artist and traveller. Besides a 
work on Gothic Ornaments, 4to, he published two very interesting books of travel, 
giving graphic sketches of life and manners, as well as of scenery, in Siberia and the 
regions of the Amoor, where for seven years he roved about on horseback, gun in 
hand, in that spirit of wild adventure of which so manj' English gentlemen are fond. 
The titles of these books are Oriental and Western Siberia, and Travels in the Regions 
of the Upper and Lower Amoor. 

Sir Alfred Russell Wallace, , an enterprising scientific traveller, has 

published several works which have given popular entertainment, while enlarging 
the boundaries of natural science : The Malay Archipelago, describing the region of 
the Orang-utan and of the Bird of Paradise ; Narrative of Travels in the Amazon 
and Rio Negro ; Palm-Trees of the Amazon. Mr. Wallace has just been knighted for 
his praiseworthy labors as a scientific explorer. 

Richard Francis Burton, 1821 , has acquired much distinction as a writer of 

travels. His chief works of this kind are : Goa and the Blue Mountains ; Sindh, or 
the Unhapi:)y Talley; Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to El Medina and Mecca; 
First Footsteps in East Africa; The Lake Regions of Central Africa; Abeokuta and 
the Cameroon Mountains ; The Highlands of Brazil ; City of the Saints, and Across 
the Rocky Mountains to California. Captain Burton entered the Indian army in 1842, 
and served for five years in Scinde under Sir Charles J. Napier. He has ti-avelled 
much through Arabia and the unexplored regions of Africa and N. America; has ac- 
quired thirty-five languages and dialects; is expert as a swordsman, a huntsman, and 
a shot; andean mix with difierent tribes without betraying himself, assuming the 
disguise of a priest, a native doctor, a bazaar-keeper, and so on. 

Sir Samuel White Baker, 1821 , is of considerable note as an adventurous 

traveller. His African explorations in 1?61-61: resulted in two works of great excel- 
lence: The Albert N'yanza Great Basin of the Nile, and The Nile Tributaries of Abys= 
sinia. He was knighted in 1866. 



MISCELLAXEOUS. 613 

John Haxxing Speke, 1S2T-1S64, was an officer in the English army, and served in the 
Crimean war. In 1S55 he accompanied Captain Burton in his African explorations. He 
afterwards revisited Africa, in company with Grant, and traced the river Nile to Lake 
K'yanza. After returning to England, he accidentally shot himself while hunting. 
His first trip, with Burton, is described in Burton's Lake Regions of Central Africa. 
Speke himself described his subsequent explorations in some papers published in 
3ilackwood"s Magazine, and in his Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile. 
Speke's discoveries were honored with several gold medals. 

David Livingstone, M.D., 1815 , the most conspicuous of modern travellers, is 

a native of Scotland. He was originally a spinner in a cotton factory. He studied for 
the ministry, and was sent, in 1840, as a missionary to South Africa. His first work 
of travels was published in 1S57, entitled Missionary Travels and Researches in South 
Africa. In 1S65 he published his Narrative of an Expedition to the Zambesi. These two 
works, and Dr. Livingstone's subsequent adventures, which have not yet been published 
by him in book-form, have made bis name one of the most famous among modern trav- 
ellers. His stj-le as a writer is simple and unpretending, but the matter itself is sufiB- 
ciently thrilling to gratify the most eager imagination. So many reports of his death 
have been recently published and then contradicted, that his actual existence begins 
to assume somewhat of a mythical character. 

Russell the Tinaes Correspondent. 

"Wlllia^i Howard Eussell, LL. D., 1821 , has acquired great 

celebrity as Special Correspondent of tlie London Times. 

Mr. Russell is a native of Ireland, and a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin. He 
was admitted to the English bar in IS-iO. His name is the representative of a certain 
conspicuous phase of modern journalism. Although not the earliest, he is the chief 
of the now numerous and powerful class of special war correspondents. 

During the Crimean war he was sent out by the London Times as their special cor- 
respondent; and such were his credentials that he was placed on intimate terms with 
the leading English oflBcers, and enabled to collect the materials for that series of bril- 
liant let*ers which established his fame. These letters were by no meaus stinted in 
their denunciations of mismanagement, and were among the prime agents in opening 
the eyes of the public to the defects of the army organization, and paving the way to 
reform. 

In 1858 and 1859 Russell travelled in India, and published his observations in the 
shape of a Diary. 

At the breaking out of the Ci^il "War in America, he was again sent out as special 
correspondent, and travelled extensively throughout the South and East. He also fol- 
lowed the Northern army through their disastrous campaigns until the summer of 
18G2, and published a number of letters in The Times, one of which, containing the 
description of the defeat at Manassas Gap. and the subsequent panic, earned for the 
writer the abiding sobriquet of Bull-Pun Russell. 

After leaving the army of the Potomac, just before McClellan's defeat, Russell re- 
turned to Washington, and continued his letters to The Times from that city. These 
later ones, however, are little more than a rehash of Wasliington war-gossip. 

In 1866, Russell accompanied the Austrian army in its disastrous Sadowa cam- 
paign, and was almost captured by the Prussians in their surprise of Chlum. Re- 
cently he has been more fortunate, accompanying the Prussians in their victorious 
march from the Rhine to Paris, and receiving the Iron Cross of the second class from 
the German Emperor. 
52 



614 TENNYSON AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 

Nearly all Russell's series of letters have been republished in book-form -svith careful 
revisions and additions. In this form they constitute a valuable contribution to what 
might be called current history. 

Russell is the prince of Special Correspondents. He possesses the happy faculty of 
seizing the essential features of a campaign, a battle, a skirmish, or a journey, and 
presenting them in a clear and vigorous style. A man of culture and education, he 
writes to please men of like tastes with himself. Hence his freedom from anything 
like bombast or exaggeration. On the other hand, his views and his way of looking 
at things are essentially narrow, not to say unjust. He carries with him, wherever he 
may go, the atmosphere of England. This will explain his m.any blunders in the United 
States and his evident incapacity to take a broad and rational view of the great civil 
controversy. No one can surpass him, however, in the power of dashing off currente 
calamo a vivid and accurate description of a battle in time for the first mail home. This 
ability to furnish the very latest news fresh from the spot and in a pleasing form, has 
revolutionized the department of newspaper-correspondence and called forth a host of 
more or less successful imitators. 

The London Times. 

The Times, of London, is the largest and most influential news- 
paper in the world. 

This paper was founded in 1785, under the title of The Daily Universal Register, 
which was changed in 1TS8 to its present title Tlie Times. The founder and proprietor 
was John Walter, a printer. It had no extraordinary merit or success until 1803, 
when John "Walter, Jr., son of the preceding, became joint- proprietor and sole man- 
ager. Mr. Walter was for many years editor as well as manager. The most conspicu- 
ous feature in his management was enterprise in getting the latest news, and fearless- 
ness in expressing opinion. 

Thomas Barnes was employed as Editor from ISli to 1811. Barnes wrote little, but 
was Eminently successful in selecting his writers, and in giving tone and direction to 
what was written. The ablest leaders under his administration were written by Ed- 
ward Sterling. It was Sterling's articles that first won for the paper the name of 
The Thunderer. 

On the death of Mr. Barnes, in 1841, John T. Delane became Editor, and has con- 
tinued in that position ever since. The salary of Mr. Delane, as Editor of The Times, 
is £5000. 

The London Times is one of the marvels of modem civilization. This newspaper, 
in its issues for a single month, possibly in a single issue, contains more that is of 
value, for literary ability, and for the amount and variety of knowledge conveyed, 
than all that was ever written in the language from the earliest ages down to the 
time of Chaucer. 



Other Journals. — The Times, however, is only a type of a class. It is now rivalled, 
in some respects eclipsed, by a considerable number of journals in the metropolis, and 
it is almost equalled by a large number in other parts of the kingdom. 

Tlie Weel-Jies.—lu mere literary ability, and simply as organs f<ir the expression of 
opinion, without reference to the item of news, all these great dailies are now dis- 
tanced by the Weeklies, of which a conspicuous example is The Saturday Review. 




Index. 



A.hhot, George, 114. 

Ahbotsford, purchased by Scott, 400. 

A-hi'lard and Eloise, by Pope, 215. 

Abere)'o»ibie, Johu, 365, 414. 

A.ber}ietJii/, John, 259. 

Absalotn and A.chitop1iel, by Dry- 
den, 187. 

JLdatn Sede, by Miss Evans, 540. 

Adams, Alexander, 367. 

Adams, Sarali F., hymnist, 136. 

Adams, "William, 324. 

Addison, Joseph, 229. 

Adonais, by Shelley, 381. 

Adventurer, The, 278. 

^neas of Troy, reputed ancestor of the 
Britons, 27. 

Age of Reason, The, by Thomas Paine, 
345. 

Aguilar, Grace, 488. 

Aids to Heflection, by Coleridge, 389. 

Aihin, John, 428; Lucy A., 429. 

Ainsworth, Henry, 1S4. 

Ainsworth, Robert, 249. 

Ainsworth, W. II., 535. 

Akenside, Mark, .308. 

Albion's JEngland, poem, by W. War- 
ner, 71. 

Alexander, Sir .Tames Edward, 612. 

Alexander, William. (See Stirling.) 

Alford, Henry, 591. 

Alison, Sir Archibald, 489: his opinion 
of Dr. Johnson, 264; Archibald, 498; 
bis opinion of Macaulay, 566. 

AUegortf of Bun van, 180. 

Alleine, Joseph, 183. 



Allen, Cardinal, 121. 

Allibone, S. Austin, his opinion of R. 
Greene, 82; of Charnock, 182; of 
Bates, 185 ; of Mrs. Behn, 193 ; of J. 
Barnes, 207; of Chatham, 249; of 
Chatterton, 316; of Nathan Drake, 
431. 

Allingham, William, 519. 

Alliteration, Saxon, 42. 

A. £. O. JE. Books, 597. 

Ames, Joseph, 250. 

Amyas Leigli, by Kingsley, 532. 

Analogy, Butler's, 253. 

Anatomy of MelancJioly, by Burton, 
105. 

Ancient JITariner, The, by Coleridge, 
3S7. 

Ancren Itiivle, description of it, 30. 

Anderson, Christopher, 482. 

Anderson, Robert, 429. 

Anglo - Saxon, its Literature, 25 ; its 
language, 26; changes wrought by 
contact with Norman French, 26; 
Hickes's Thesaurus of, 200; History 
of, by Sharon Turner, 497; Diction- 
ary, by Bosworth, 506. 

Angus, Joseph, G07. 

Anitnated N^ature, by Goldsmith, 304. 

Annesley, Arthur, 160. 

Annual Jirgister, Dodsley, 22S. 266. 

Annus 3Tirabilis, of Dryden, 187. 

Anson, Lord (leorge, 289. 

Ansfeg, Cbristojiher, 313. 

Anthony a Wood, 202. 

Antiquary, by W. Scott, 400. 
615 



616 



INDEX. 



Apollo, The, a famous tavern in London, 
89. 

ArbutJinot, Jolm, 234-. 

Arcadia, a philosophical romance, by 
Sidney, 66. 

Archer, James, 323. 

Arden, Mary, mother of Shakespeare, 85. 

Areopag itica, hy Milton, 144. 

Argyle, Duke of, 555. 

Ariosto's, Orlando Furioso, translated 
by Harrington, 59. 

Annorica, or Brittany, a storehouse of 
British legends, 27. 

Armstrong, John, 309. 

Arnald, Richard, 256. r 

Arnold, Samuel, Jr., 398. 

Arnold, Thomas, of Rugby, 497 ; Mat- 
thew, 498. 

Arnold, Thomas Kerchever, 507. 

Arnott, Neil, 473. 

Arrowsmith, Aaron, 366. 

Art of Sinking, by Pope, 234. 

Arthur, King, his Dream, 32. 

Ascham, Roger, 101. 

Asgill, John, 245. 

Ash, John, 294. 

Ashmole, Elias, 202. 

Assheton, William, 206. 

Astell, Mrs. Mary, 246. 

Astle, Thomas, 369. 

Astronomical Discourses, by Chal- 
mers, 475. 

Astrophel, a pseudonym of Sidney, 67. 

Athence Oxonienses, by Anthony a 
Wood, 202. 

Athenceiim, London, its opinion of Ade- 
laide Procter, 515 ; of Wilkie Collins, 
535 ; of Douglas Jerrold, 552. 

Atkinson, Thomas Witlam, 612. 

Atkyns, Richard, 168 ; Sir Robert, 200. 

Atterhury, Bishop, 236. 

Auber, Harriet, hymnist, 136. 

Aubrey, John, 201. 

Austen, Lady, her relations to Cowper, 
327. 

Aurora ILeigli, by Mrs. Browning, 512. 

Atisten, .Jane, 402. 

Austin, John, a hymnist, 134. 

Aitstin, Mrs. Sarah, 499. 

Aylmer, John, 112. 

Ayloffe, Sir Joseph, 290. 

Ayscough, Samuel, 36S. 

Aytoun, William Edmondstone, 517. 

Jinhhnge, Charles, 567. 

Sacon, Francis, Baron of Verulam, 99. 



JBacon, Mrs. Annie, 105. 

Bailey, Nathan, 249. 

Bailey, Philip James, 516. 

BailLie, Joanna, 390. 

Haines, Edward, Thomas, 509. 

Baker, Sir Richard, 103. 

Baker, Samuel White, 612. 

Baker, Thomas, 250. 

Baker, William, Henry, David E., 291. 

Baldtvin, William, 71. 

Bale, John, antiquary, 60. 

Balfour, Alexander, 398 ; James, 354. 

Balguy, John, 255. 

Ballantyne, John, James, 434. 

Ballard, George, 293. 

Bamx>ton, Rev. John, 256. 

Bano-oft, Richard, 111. 

Banini, John, 455. 

Banks, John, 193. 

Barbauld, Mrs. Anna Letitia, 427; a 

hymnist, 136. 
Barbour, John, early Scotch poet, 47, 48. 
Barclay, Alexander, 57 ; Robert, 208. 
Barhani, Richard Harris, " Thomas In- 

goldsby," 449. 
Barker, Edmund Henry, 505. 
Barnard, Lady Anne, 333. 
Barnes, Rev. Albert, his opinion of Dr. 

Johnson, 265. 
Barnes, Barnaby, 74 ; Joshua, 207. 
Barnftcld, Richard, 74. 
Barrington, John Shute, 260. 
Barrow, Isaac, 174. 
Barrow, Sir John, John, 495. 
Barry Cormvall, B. W. Procter, 514. 
Bartlett, William Henry, 497. 
Barton, Bernard, 452. 
Barton, William, a hymnist, 134. 
Bate, Julius, S18. 
Bates, William, 185. 
Battle of Ivry, by Macaulay, 565. 
Baxter, Andrew, 291 ; Richard, 177. 
Bayley, Frederic, W. N., 508. 
Bayly, Thomas Haynes, 452. 
Bayne, Peter, 607. 
Beattie, James, 328 ; William, 497. 
Beaumont and Fletcher, account of, 

90 ; extract, 97. 
Beatimont, Joseph, 190. 
Beekford, William. 405. 
Becky Sharp, by Thackeray, 525. 
Beddoes, Thomas, 365. 
Beddome, Beniamin, a hymnist, 135. 
Beecheif, Sir Frederick William, 495. 
Beggar's Opera, The, by Gay, 217. 
Be Jin, Mrs. Aphra, 193. 



INDEX, 



617 



Belcher, Sir Ed^yard, 496. 

Bell, Andrew, 434. 

JScM, Sir Charles, 474. 

Bell, John, 289. 

Belle of the Ball- Room, by Praed,452. 

Bellenden, Sir Jolin, 57. 

Beloe, William, 366. 

Belshani, Thomas, William, 426. 

Beiiger, Elizabeth Ogilvy, 436. 

Bennett, Benjamin, 259. 

Be}inett, James, 482. 

Bennett, Thomas, 256. 

Benson, George, 259. 

Benson, Joseph, 425. 

Benthatn, Ed\Yard, 322. 

Bentham, Jeremy, 416. 

Bentleij, Richard, 239. 

Berington, Joseph, 376. 

Berhcleij, Bishop, 237. 

Berkcnhout, John, 367. 

Berners, Lord, 57. 

Bevan, Joseph Gurney, 426. 

Beveridge, William, 203. 

Bible in Spain, The, by Barrow, 456. 

Bickerstajf, Isaac, 338. 

Bickei'stetJi, Edward, 482; opinion of 
Horsley, 352. 

BicJcersteth, Edward Henry, 520. 

Biddle, John, 184. 

Bilson, Thomas, 112, 123. 

BhigJiam, Joseph, 256. 

Birch, Thomas, 293. 

Bishop, Samuel, 339. 

Bishops' Bible, The, 121. 

Bisset, Robert, 36G. 

Blackburne, Francis, 321. 

Blachfriar's Theatre, 83, 85. 

BUicMocU, Thomas, 339. 

Blachmore, Sir Richard, 219. 

BlacJcstone, Sir William, 271. 

Blachwell, Thomas, 291. 

Blackwood's Magazine, its opinion 
of Milton, Pope, and Dryden, 215 ; of 
Bloomfiield, 396; of Charlotte Bronte, 
457; of Barry Cornwall, 514; of Dis- 
raeli, 528. 

Blair, Hugh, 355 ; his opinion of Shaftes- 
bury, 235; of Burns, 320. 

Blair, Robert, 221. 

Jilakey, Robert, 471. 

Blatichard, Laman, 508. 

Blank Verse, first introduced by Sur- 
rey, 68. 

Blarneg- Stone, version in Greek by 
" Father Prout," 468. 

Blayney, Richard, 361. 

52* 



Bleak House, by Dickens, 524. 

Blenheim, Battle of, by Addison, 230. 

Blessington, Margaret, Countess of, 403. 

Blind Harrg, 49. 

Blomfield, Bishop, 505. 

Bloomfield, S. T., 591 ; Robert, 395. 

Blonnt, Thomas, and Sir Henry, 169; 
Charles, 201. 

Blunt, Henry, 482. 

Boaden, James, 398. 

Body of Divinity, by Stackhouse, 255. 

Bolingbrokc, A'iscount, 235. 

Bonar, Horatius, 520 ; a hymnist, 136. 

Book of Martyrs, Fox's, 109, 

Borrow, George, 456. 

Boscaiven, William, 334. 

Boston, Thomas, 259. 

Bos well, .James, 265. 

BoswortJi, Joseph, 506. 

Botanic Garden, by Darwin, 328. 

Boivles, William Lisle, 397. 

Bowring, Sir John, 469 ; a hymnist, 136. 

Boyd, Andrew K. H., 607. 

Boyle, Hon. Robert, 195 ; Charles, John, 
240. 

Boys, John, 114. 

Brady, Nicholas, 132, 191. 

Brady, Robert, 201. 

Braithwait, Richard, 156. 

Bramhall, John, 176. 

Brewster, Sir David, 556. 

Bride of Abydos, by Byron, 379. 

Bridge, William, 184. 

Bridge of Sighs, by Hood, 450. 

Bridgewater Treatises, 476. 

Britannia, Camden's, 107. 

British Aristarchus, applied to Bent- 
ley, 239. 

British Quarterly, opinion of Ingolds- 
by Legends, 449. 

Brittany, or Armorica, a storehouse of 
British legends, 27. 

Brttton, John, 493. 

Broadstone of Honor, by Digby, 583. 

Brome, Alexander, Richard, 156. 

Bront^, Charlotte, Anne, Emily, Patrick, 
457. 

Brooke, Henry, 314. 

Brooke, Mrs. Frances, 315. 

Brooke, Lor^l, 68. 

Brookes, Thomas, 184. 

Brooks, Shirley, 518. 

Brougliatn, Henry, Lord, 459; anecdote 
of Walpole, 239; opinion of Burke, 
267 ; of Fox, 268; of Gibbon, 275. 

Broughton, Hugh, 112. 



618 



INDEX. 



Jiroiighton, Thomas, 291. 
Srowtif Charles Armitage, 504. 
Brown, John, 283. 
Urown, John, 607. 
Urown, John, of Haddington, 321. 
Mrown, Thomas, 413. 
Jit own, Tom, 191. 
lirowne, Isaac Hawkins, 222. 
Mrowne, Simon, 248; a hymnist, 135. 
lirowne. Sir Thomas, 162. 
Jlrowne, William, 75, 222. 
Browning , Robert, 511 ; Mrs. Elizabeth 

Barrett B., 512. 
Bruce, James, the traveller, 290. 
Bruce, The, of Barbour, 47. 
_Srttw.ne, Robert of, 31. 
Brut, or Brutus, of England, 27 ; origin 

of the legend, 27 ; The Brute of Bar- 
bour, 47. 
Bryan, Michael, 440. 
Bryant, Jacob, 360. 
Brydges, Sir Egerton, 430. 
Buchanan, Robert, 523. 
Buch, Charles, 376. • 
Buckingham, James Silk, 496. 
Btickland, William, 472. 
BucJcle, Henry Thomas, 554. 
Budgell, Eustace, 230. 
Bttll, George, 205. 
Bulwer-Lytton, Sir Edward George, 

626 ; Lady Rosina, Sir Henry Lytton, 

527 ; Edward R., 522. 
Bunyan, John, 179. 
Burclihardt, John Ludwig, 441, 
Burder, George, 426. 
Burgh, James, 292. 
Burke, Edmund, 265 ; his opinion of Fox, 

268. 
Burke, John and Bernard, 493. 
Burnet, Gilbert, 205. 
Burnet, Thomas, 201. 
Burney, Fanny, 339; Charles, 340; 

James, 341. 
Burns, Robert, 329. 
Burrotigh, Edward, 212. 
Burton, Henry, 183. 
Burton, John Hill, 573. 
Burton, Robert, 105. 
Burton, R. F., 612. 
Bury, Lady Charlotte, 455. 
Butler, Alban, 323. 
Butler, Charles, 426; his opinion of 

Gother, 207 ; of Alban Butler, 322. 
Btitler, Joseph, Bishop, 253. 
Butler, Samuel, 151. 
Butler, William Archer, 482. 



By field, Nicholas, 183. 

Byrom, John, 311 ; a hymnist, 136. 

Byron, Lord, 377 ; witticism on Berkeley, 

237 ; an admirer of Lady Blessington, 

403. 

Cadenus, a pseudonym of Swift's, 2.34. 

Cadwalader, King of the Early Brit- 
ons, 27. 

Caiti, by Byron, 379. 

Calamy, Edmund, 182. 

Calderwood, David, 185. 

Caleh Williams, by Godwin, 345, 346. 

Call to the Unconverted, Baxter's, 178. 

Calvin, his connection with English 
Hymnody, 131. 

Cainden, William, 109. 

Campbell, George, 355. 

Campbell, John, 293. 

Campbell, John, Lord Chief Justice, 
492 ; his opinion of Erskine, 410. 

Campbell, R., a hymnist, 137. 

Campbell, Thomas, account of him, 383 ; 
his opinion of Giles and Phineas 
Fletcher, 76 ; of Roscommon, 190 ; of 
Vaughan, 190; of Akenside, 308; of 
Churchill, 309 ; of Allan Ramsay, 309 ; 
of Young's Night Thoughts, 310. 

Caudish, Robert S., 595. 

Canning, George, 410. 

Cantet'bury Tales, description of the 
poem, 37, 38 ; Tyrwhitt's edition, 284. 

Capell, Edward, 294. 

Cardiphonia, by Rev. John Newton, 
328. 

Careiv, Thomas, 151. 

Carey, Henry, 167, 313. 

Carleton, William, 536. 

Carlyle, Thomas, 541 ; his opinion of 
Burns, 330. 

Carpenter, William B., 474; Lant, 482. 

Carte, Thomas, 248. 

Carter, Mrs. Elizabeth, 286. 

Cartwright, William, 155. 

Cary, Henry Francis, 505. 

Caryl, Joseph, 183. 

Cases of Conscience, Pike's, 321. 

Castle of Indolence, hj Thomson, 219. 

Castvall, E., a hymnist, 137. 

Cataline, by Ben Jonson, 89 ; by Croly, 
448. 

Catechism, The Shorter, 128. 

Catholic Bible, The, 121. 

Cato, tragedy of, by Addison, 230. 

Cave, Edward, 251. 

Cave, William, 258. 



INDEX. 



619 



Cavendish, George, 56. 

Cavendish, Henry, 365. 

Cavendish, Margcaret, 155. 

Cavendisli, William, 155, 189. 

Cnxton, account of him, 54. 

Caoctons, The, by Bulwer, 526. 

Cecil, Richard, 376. 

Cecilia, Ode to, by Dryden, 187. 

Celts, their literature, 2a : their legends, 
27 ; their reputed oz'igin, 28. 

Cennick, John, a hymnist, 136. 

Ceutlivre, Mrs. Susannah, 228. 

Chabot, Charles, examines the hand- 
writing of Junius, 270. 

CJialloner, Bishop, 122, 322. 

Chalmers, Alexander, 429; opinion of 
Ashmole, 202; of Ayscough, 368. 

Chahners, George, 433. 

Chalmers, Thomas, 474. 

CJiamberlayne, Edward, John, 199. 

Chambers, Ephraim, 250. 

Chambers, J. D., a hymnist, 137. 

Chambers, William and Robert, account 
of them, 601 ; opinion of Sackville, 70 ; 
of Massinger, 94 ; of Cowley, 148 ; of 
Herrick, 150 ; of Cartwright, 155 ; of 
Clarendon, 157 ; of Dryden, 187 ; of 
Robert Blair, 221; of Steele, 232; of 
Graham, 331 ; of Johnson, 204. 

Chandler, John, a hymnist, 137. 

Chandler, Samuel, 259. 

Chapman, George, 92. 

Cliaptnan, John, 321, 

Chapone, Mrs. Hester, 288. 

Characteristics, by Shaftesbury, 235. 

Chardin, Sir John, 251. 

CharJce, Mrs. Charlotte, 227. 

CJiarles I., 164. 

Charles V., Robertson's, 276. 

diaries, Mrs. Elizabeth, 596. 

Charles Grandison, Sir, by Richard- 
son, 295. 

Charles O'Malley, by Lever, 533. 

Charlotte Elizabeth, Mrs. Tonna, 487. 

CJtarnoeJc, Stephen, 182. . 

CJiatham, Earl of, 271. 

Chatterton, Thomas, 315. 

Chaucer, English before his day, 25-34 ; 
an account of his life and writings, 
35-38; his contemporaries, 39-45; 
biography by Godwin, 345 ; edited by 
Tyrwhitt, 284. 

Chemlstri/ of a Candle, by Faraday 
557. 

Chesterfield, Lord, 269. 



Chettle, Henry, 84. 
Chetwood, W. R., 293. 
Childe Harold, by Byron, 378. 
Chillingworth, William, 176. 
Chinese Letters, by Goldsmith, 302. 
Christabel, by Coleridge, 387. 
Christian Year, The, by Keble, 447. 
Christopher North, John Wilson, 461. 
Chronicle, e?iT\'wst Rhyming, 28; Laya- 

mon's, 28; Robert of Gloucester's, 30; 

Robert of Brunne's, 31; Wyntoun's, 

48 ; Froissart's, translated by Berners, 

67 ; C. of Scotland, by Bellenden, 57 ; 

C. of England, by Sir R. Baker, 105 ; 

Stow's C, 109. 
Chrjjsostom, his prayer, 127 ; edition of 

his works by Saville, 104. 
C/i«&&, Thomas, 260. 
Churchill, Charles, 308. 
Chnrch-Liatin, 25. 
Gibber, CoUey, 226; Theophilus, 227. 
Civilization, History of, by Buckle, 554. 
Chiggett, William, 177. 
Clapperton, Hugh, 441. 
C^«J-e, Juhn, 453. 
Clarendon, Earl of, 156. 
Claridge, Richard, 260. 
Clarissa Harlotve, by Richardson, 295. 
Clarke, Adam, 424. 
Clarke, Edward Daniel, 441. 
Clarke, Mrs. Mary Cowden, 608. 
Clarke, Samuel, 242, 184. 
Clarkson, Thomas, 435. 
Clieveland, John, 160. 
Cobbett, William, 411. 
Cobden, Richard, 548. 
Cockbnrn, Mrs. Catherine, 228. 
Cockbiirn, Lord, 470. 
Coelebs, in Search of a Wife, by Hannah 

Moi-e, 339. 
Coke, Thomas, 372. 

Colenso, John W^ , Bishop of Natal, 586. 
Coleridge, Derwent, Henry Nelson, Sarah 

H., and Sir John T., 390. 
Coleridge, Hartley, 389; his estimate of 

Ford, 95. 
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 387 ; estimate 

of Chaucer, 38; of Field, 114; of Sir 

Thomas Brown, 162: of Fuller, 171; 

of Bunyan, 180 ; of Wordsworth, 444. 
Collier, Jeremy, 228. 
Collier, J. Payne, 577. 
Collins, Anthony, 245. 
Collins, Wilkio, 5.Sn. 
Collins, William, 307 
Colnian, George, 337, 398. 



620 



INDEX 



Colton, Caleb C, 435. 

Cotton, Charles, 155. 

Colton, Sir Robert Bruce, 109, 

Combe, George, Andrew, 474. 

Comber, Thomas, 206. 

Complete A.ngler, by Izaak Walton, 
165. 

Conder, Josiah, 482 ; a hymnist, l36. 

Confessio Amantis, by Gower, 40. 

Cotifession of Faith, The, 128. 

Congreve, William, 225. 

Coningsby, by Disraeli, 528. 

Conington, John, 610. 

Consolation of l*hilosophy , by Chau- 
cer, 38. 

Conybeare, John J., William D., Wil- 
liam J., 484. 

CooTc, Eliza, 517. 

Cook, Capt. James, 289. 

Cooke, Thomas, 222. 

Cork, Earl of, 195, 240. 

Corn-Z,aw Rhytner, Ebenezer Elliott, 
448. 

Corsair, The, by Byron, 379. 

Coryat, Thomas, 108. 

Cosin, John, Prayer by him, 127 ; his 
life, 175. 

Cottagers of Glenburnie, by Eliza- 
beth Hamilton, 342. 

Cottle, Amos, Joseph, 431. 

Country Parson, by Herbert, 76. 

Cotintry Parson, Eecreations of, by 
Boyd, 607. 

Country Wife, The, by Wycherley, 224. 

Course of Time, by Pollok, 396. 

Court of Love, by Chaucer, 38. 

Coverdale, Miles, his version of the 
Bible, 118. 

Cotvley, Abraham, 147 ; his opinion of 
Crashaw, 155. 

Cowley, Mrs. Hannah, 332. 

Cowper, William, 326; a hymnist, 136; 
his opinion of Beattie, 329. 

Coace, William, Archdeacon, 441. 

Crabb, George, 506. 

Crabbe, G eorge, 393. 

Cradock, Samuel, 206. 

Craik, George L., 545 ; estimate of Dun- 
bar, 51 ; of Drayton. 73 ; of Beaumont 
and Fletcher, 91 ; of Dryden, 190 ; of 
Blair, 221 ; of Garth, 222 ; of Beattie, 
329. 

Cranmer's Bible, 119; his connection 
with the Prayer-Book, 121. 

Crashaw, Richard, 154. 

Creech, Thomas, 191. 



Creed, The^ Prymer form of it, 123; 
Bishop Pearson's Exposition, 173. 

Crimea, Invasion of. by Kinglake, 582. 

Critici Sacri, Poole's, 181. 

Criticism, Essay on, by Pope, 214. 

Croft, Herbert, 206. 

Croker, T. Crofton, John Wilson, 470. 

Croly, George, 448. 

Crombie, Alexander, 506. 

Crowquill, Alfred, pseudonym of Alfred 
H. Forrester, 552. 

Cruden, Alexander, o20. 

Cry of the Children, by Mrs. Brown- 
ing, 513. 

Cudworth, Ralph, 174. 

Cumming, John, 594. 

Cunniiighaui, Allan, 490; his opinion 
of Sir Tliomas Browne, 102 ; of Boyle, 
196 ; of Bolingbroke, 236 ; of Miss Bur- 
ney, 340 ; of Godwin's Caleb Williams, 
347 ; of Campbell, 384; of Miss Ferrier, 
403: of Gifford, 408; of Disraeli, 527. 

Cunning Jiani, Peter, 490. 

Curiosities of Literature, by Disraeli, 
527. 

Curtain IiCctures, Mi's. Caudle's, by 
Douglas Jerrold, 552. 

Dairy mean's Daughter, by Legh 
Richmond, 425. 

Dallas, E. S., 551. 

Dallas, Robert C, 435. 

Dalrymple, David, '289. 

Damon and I'ythias, early English 
tragedy, SO. 

Dampier, Capt. William, 201. 

Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, a poem, 
by Dunbar, 50. 

Daniel, Samuel, 72. 

D'Arblay, Madame, 339 ; her opinion 
of the Paston Letters, 343. 

Darling, James, 495. 

Darwin, Charles, 558; Erasmus, 328. 

i)ave>irtH«^ Charles, 246; Sir William, 151 

David Copperfield, by Dickens, 524. 

Davideis, a poem, by Cowley, 147. 

Davidson, Samuel, 596. 

Davies, Sir John, 104. 

Davies, Thomas, 293. 

Davis, John, 108. 

Davy, Sir Humphry, 418 ; his opinion of 
Watt, 419. 

Day, Thomas, 448. 

Decision of Character, by John Fos- 
ter, 466. 

Decker, Thomas, 93. 



'INDEX. 



621 



Decline and Fall of the Roman Em- 
pire, by Gibbon, 273. 

Defence of Poesie, by Sir P. Sidney, 67. 

De Foe, Daniel, 2JH. 

Deistical Writers, Leland's, 258. 

Delany, Patrick, 257. 

Delaune, Thomas, 258. 

Delphin Classics, editionhyYal'pj, 504. 

Denham, Sir John, 154. 

Denham aird Clapperton, 441. 

Dennis, John, 227. 

De Qaincey, Thomas, 463. 

Derhy, Earl, 550. 

Dermody, Thomas, 333. 

Descent of Man, by Darwin, 558. 

Deserted Village, The, by Goldsmith, 
301. 

Diary of a Physician, by Warren, 
534. 

Dihdin, Charles, Thomas, 334. 

Dihdin, Thomas F., 494 ; his opinion of 
Dugdale, 168 ; of Gough, 368. 

Dicli, Thomas, 483. 

Dichens, Charles, 623. 

Dictionary , English, Ed\yard Phillips, 
167 ; Bailey, 249 ; Johnson, 203 ; Sheri- 
dan, 335 ; Walker, 3C1 ; Kenrick, Ash, 
294; Todd, 492; Richardson, 609. 

Diffby, Sir Kenelm, 1C3 ; Kenelm, 583. 

Digges, Leonard, Thomas, Dudley, 103. 

DilJce, Charles Wentworth, 551. 

Dilworth, Thomas, 294. 

Disraeli, Benjamin, 528. 

Disraeli, Isaac, 527 ; his opinion of Iley- 
lin, 176; of Dennis, 228; of Neal^ 259; 
of Dibdin, 494. 

Diversions ofFurley,hj Ilorne Tooke, 
356. 

Divine J^egation of Moses, by War- 
burton, 310. 

Divorce, Milton's treatise, 143. 

Dixon, Hepworth, 575. 

Doctor, The, by Southey, 386. 

Dod, Charles Roger, 508 ; John, 115. ' 

Dodd, Charles. 260; William, 318. 

Doddridge, Philip, 257 ; a hj'mnist, 155. 

Dodsley, Robert, 228. 

Dodwell, Henry, 256. 

Douihey and Son, by Dickens, 524. 

Domestic Maimers of the Ameri- 
cans, by Mrs. Trollope, 529. 

Do}i (Tuan, by Byron, 379. 

Doolittle, Thomas, 207. 

Dorset, Earl of, 70 ; author of Ferrex and 
Porrex, 80, 189. 

Douay Bible, 121. 



Double Dealer, by Congreve, 225. 

Douce, Francis, 493. 

Douglas, Gawin, early Scotch poet, 51. 

Douglas, a play by Home, 337. 

D'Oyley, George,481. 

DraUe, Nathan, an account of him, 430 ; 
his opinion of Wotton, 74; of Stow, 
109 ; of Wither, 149 ; of Hughes, 221 ; 
of Bloomfield, 395. 

Drahe, James, 201. 

Drama, English, its rise, 79. 

Drayton, Michael, 73. 

Drew, Samuel, 414. 

Drunimond of Hawthornden, 76. 

Dry den, John, 185 ; his opinion of Den- 
ham, 154; of Roscommon, 188; of 
Walsh, 221. 

Duenna, The, by Sheridan, 335. 

Duff, Alexander, 483. 

Dugdale, Sir William, 168. 

Dunbar, William, early Scotch poet, 50. 

Dunciad, The, by Pope, 214. 

Dunton, John, 251. 

D'lTrfey, Tom, 227. 

Dyce, Alexander, 576; editor of Peele, 
84; of Middleton, 92; of Webster, 94 ; 
of Shirley, 96. 

Dyer, George, 504. 

Dyer, John, 307. 

Dymond, Jonathan, 414. 

FacJiard, John, 200. 

Eadie, John, 596. 

Farthly Faradise, Morris, 522. 

Eastlahe, Charles L., 506. 

Ecce Homo, by Prof. Seeley, 587. 

Ecclesiastical Folity, Hooker's, 113. 

Echard, Lawrence, 250. 

Eden, Lady Emily, 551. 

Eden, Richard, 108. 

Edgeworth, Maria, 401 ; Richard Lovell, 
E , 401. 

Edinburgh Feview, opinion of Beat- 
tie, 329; of Whitefield,371; of Byron, 
379 ; of Moore, 380 ; of Joanna Baillie, 
391 ; of Lady Blessington, 403 ; of 
Bentham, 416 ; of Sir Egerton Brydges, 
430; of Gillies, 434; founded by Syd- 
ney Smith and others, 458, 459,460; 
of Lingard, 489; of Alison, 489; of 
Lord Campbell, 492 ; of Arnold, 497 ; 
of Barry Cornwall, 515. 

Edmeston, James, a hyninist, 136. 

Edmondson, Joseph, 290. 

Edumrds, George, 291. 

Edwards, John, 206. 



622 



INDEX. 



JEdwardSf Richard, 81. 
Edwnrdst Thomas, 317. 
^ffl/ptology, Young, 562; Wilkinson, 

5G3. 
JEiTion SasiliJce, and EilionoTilastes, 

147, 161. 
JElegy in a Country Churchyard, 

by Gray, 396. 
JEleinents of Criticism, Karnes's, 282. 
JElid, Essays of, by Lamb, 131. 
Elliott, Charlotte, 521 ; a liymnist, 136. 
Elliott, Ebenezer, 448. 
Ellis, George, account of, 361 ; his opinion 

of Drayton's Poly-OIbion, 73. 
Ellis, Mrs., 604. 
Elphinstone, James, 361. 
Elwood, Tliomas, 211. 
Elyot, Sir Thomas, 60. 
Einsley, Peter, 439. 
Enfield, William, 367. 
English Bards and Scotch Heview- 

evs, 378. 
English Sihle. The different Aversions, 

115. 
English Dictionary. (See Diction- 
ary.) 
English Gr a m tn a r, Wallis, 200 ; 

Lowth,317 ; Liiidley Murraj^ 362. 
English Hymnody, 129. 
English Language, how far back it 

goes. 26 ; a mixed language, 2fi ; 

changes caused by the jostling of 

Norman and Saxon speech, 26. 
English Literature, what it is not, 

and what it is, 25 ; what it includes, 

and how divided, 26 ; at what point it 

begins, 26. 
English Past and Present, by 

Trench, 590. 
English Prayer-JBooJe, 124. 
English Header, Murray's, 362. 
Epistles of Phalaris, controversy 

about them, 238, 239. 
EpithaUnnium, by Spenser, 64. 
Eras}mis, his encomium on Skelton, 56; 

Latin witticisms, 469. 
Erskine, Ebenezer, Ralph, John, 319. 
ErsMne, Thomas, 410. 
Essays and Reviews, ill. 
Ethevidge, Sir George, 190. 
Ettrick Shepherd, a pseudonym of 

Hogg, 395: his opinion of Wiffin, 397. 
Eugene Aram, by Bulwer, 626. 
Enphues, Lyly's, 81. 
Eustace, John Chetwood, 439. 
Evans, John, 425. 



Evans, Marian, "George Eliot," 540. 
Eve of St. Agnes, by Keats, 383. 
Evelyn, John, 197 : Thomas, 260. 
Evenings at Home, by Dr. Aikin and 

Mrs. Barbauld, 428. 
Every 3Ian in his Humor, by Ben 

Jonson, 89. 
Excursion, The, by Wordsworth, 446. 
Exile, Reflections upon, by Bolingbroke, 

236. 
Exile of Erin, by Campbell, 384. 

Faber, F. W., 520 ; his opinion of the 
English Bible, 124. 

Faber, George Stanley, 589. 

Fairbairn, Patrick, 595. 

Fairfax, Edward, translator of Tasso, 73. 

Fairy Queen, by Spenser, 64. 

Falconer, William, 312. 

Family Expositor, Doddridge's, 257. 

FansJiawe, Sir Richard, Lady, 154. 

Faraday, Michael, 556. 

Farmer, Hugh, 320: Richard, 291. 

Fai'tner's Hoy, by Bloomfield, 395. 

FarquJiar, George, 226. 

Father of EnglisJt Poetry, Chaucer 
so calle'd, 35. 

Father Prout, 468. 

Father Tom and the Pope, its au- 
thorship, 468. 

Faustus, drama by Marlowe, 83. 

Faivcett, John, a hymnist, 135. 

Fell, John. 291. 

Fell owes, Sir Charles, 579. 

Feltham, Owen, 160. 

Female Quixote, by Mrs. Lennox, 342. 

Fenn, Lady Eleanor, Sir John, 342. 

Fenton, Elijah, 221. 

Ferguson, Adam, 354 ; James, 292 ; Rob- 
ert, 315. 

Fergusson, James, 608. 

Ferrers, George, contributor to Mirrour 
for Magistrates, 71. 

Ferrex and Porrex, the earliest Eng- 
lish tragedy, 80. 

Ferriar, John, 369. 

Ferrier, James F., 551 ; Mary, 403. 

Fesfas, by Baily, 516. 

Field, Richard, 114. 

Fielding, Henry, 296. 

Finlay, George, 573. 

Finlay, John, 396. 

Flavel, John, 204. 

Flaxman, John, 437. 

Flecknoe, Richard, 192. 

Fleetwood, John, 376. 



A 



I X D E X . 



623 



Fleetwood, ■SVilliam, 255. 

I'letchev, Andrew, of Saltoun, 201. 

Fletcher, Giles and Pliineas, 75. 

Florio, John, 103. 

Flower and Leaf, poem bj- Chaucer, 3S. 

Foote, Samuel, 336. 

Forbes, Duncan, 245. 

Forbes, James, 364 ; James D., 561. 

Force of Truth, hy Dr. Scott, 420. 

Ford, John. 94. 

Fordyce, David. James, 2S3. 

Forrester, Alfred Henry, "Alfred Crow- 
quill,'" 552. 

Forster, John, 574; his opinion of Gold- 
smith, 305. 

Fortunatiis, or The Wishing Cap, a play 
by Decker, 93. 

FosbrooJce, T. D., 493. 

Foscari, The Two, by Byron, 379. 

Foster, Geo., 365; James, 260; John, 460. 

Fourfold State, Boston's, 259. 

Fox, Charles James, 26S; George, 20S; 
John, 111. 

Francis, Sir Philip, 269. 

Franldin, Sir John, 496. 

Franiclin's opinion of Whitefield, 371. 

Fraser, Prof. Alexander Campbell, 551. 

Fraser, James Baillie, 496. 

Freemasonry , works on, 608. 

Friars of Herwicli, by Dunbar, 51. 

Froude, James Anthony, 567 ; his opin- 
ion of Knox, 110 ; of the English Bible, 
124. 

Fry, Mrs. Elizabeth, 485 ; Caroline, 483. 

Fudge Family, in Paris, by Moore, 
380. 

Fuller, Andrew, 376. 

Fuller, Thomas, 170 ; his opinion of 
Tusser, 59 ; of Daniel, 72 ; of Shake- 
speare and B. Jonson, 90; of Jewel, 
111; of Bishop Hall, 169. 

Fullerton, Lady Georgiana, 540. 

Gale, Theophilus, 204. 

Gall, Richard, 333. 

Gait, John, 404. 

Galvanic Novels, by Mrs. Shelley, 3S2. 

Game and l*lay of Chess, the first 

book printed in England, 54. 
Gammer Gurton's Needle, an early 

English comedy, SO. 
Garrich, David, 336. 
Garth, Sir Samuel. 222. 
Gascoif/ne, George, 81. 
Gaskell, Mrs. Elizabeth, 541. 
Qauden, John, 176. 



Gay, John, 216. 

Gay Science, The, by E. S. Dallas, 551. 

Geddes, Alexander, 376. 

Gell, Sir William, 439. 

Geneva nible, 119. 
I Gentle SJiepherd, by Allan Ramsay, 
I 309. 

Geoffrey of Monmouth, author of His- 
toria Britonum, 28. 

George Eliot, a pseudonym for Miss 
Evans, 540. 

Gerard, Alexander, 356. 

German Uynvns, translated, 137. 

Gertrude of Wyatning, by Campbell, 
384. 

Gibbon, Edward, 272; his opinion of 
Law's Serious Call, 319 ; of Alban But- 
ler, 323. 

Gibbons, Thomas, 372 ; a hymnist, 135. 

Gifford, WiUiam, 407; editor of Ben 
Jonson, 89 ; of Shirley, 97. 

Giles, John A., 579; Henry, his opinion 
of Goldsmith, 305. 

Giles Overreach, Sir, by Massinger, 94. 

Gilfillan, George, 602. 

Gill, John, 320. 

Gill, Thomas H., a hymnist, 137. 

Gillesj>ie, George, 183. 

Gillies-, John, 4:j3. 

Giljiin, William, 363. 

Gladstone, Rt. Hon. William E., 547. 

Glanville, Joseph, 200. 

Gleig, George R., 603. 

Gloucester, Robert of, monk of G. ab- 
bey, 30. 

Glover, Richard, 337. 

GodoljiJiin, John. 160. 

Godolphin, Sidney, 156. 

Godwin, William, 345. 

Goldsmith, Oliver, 301. 

Good, John Mason, 415 ; his opinion of 
Junius, 269. 

Goode, William Francis, 483. 

Goodwin, John, 160; Thomas. 184. 

Gore, Mrs. Catherine Grace, 540. 

Gorton, John, 440. 

Gosse, Philip Henry, 566. 

Gother, John, 207. 

Gouge, Thomas, 177 ; William, 176. 

Gough, Richard, 367. 

Gower, John, acconnt of him, 39, 40. 

GraJiame, James. 330. 

Grammar, English, by Wallis, 198 ; 
Lowth, 317 ; Murray, 363. 

Grant, Mrs. Anne, of Laggan, 392. 

Gi'unt, James, 575. 



624 



INDEX. 



Ch'ant, Sir Robert, a hymnist, 136. 

Granville, George, 221. 

Grasmere, residence of Wordsworth, 

445. 
Graftan, Rt. Hon. Henry, 350. 
Grattan, Thomas Colley, 535. 
Gray, Thomas, 305. 
Gi-eat Bible, The, 119. 
Greater Britain, by Dilke, 552. 
Green, Matthew, 307. 
Greene, Robert, 82. 
Greenvill, Dora, 521. 
G^'egory, Olinthus, 415; his opinion of 

Robert Hall, 421, 422. 
GriffitJi Gaunt, by C. Reade, 530, 
Groat's Worth of Wit, by R. Greene, 82. 
Grose, Francis, 368. 
G^'ote, George, 566. 
Grove, Henry, 258. 
Guardian, The, 231. 
Gulliver's Travels, 233. 
Gull's Sorn-BooJc, by Decker, 93. 
Gunning, Peter, Prayer composed by 

him, 126. 
Gurney, Joseph John, 485. 
6fM«/i,r-ie, Thomas, 595; William, 292. 

Hahington, William, 153. 

MaMuyt, Richard, lu8. 

Ilaldane, Robert and James, 484. 

Male, Mrs. Sarah J., her opinion of Mrs. 
Barbauld, 428 ; of Grace Aguilar, 488. 

Hale, Sir Matthew, 159. 

Haley, William, 425. 

Hall, Bishop, 168 ; Capt. Basil, 496 ; Mr. 
and Mrs S. C, 537 ; Newman, 594. 

Hall, Robert, 421 ; his opinion of John 
Foster, 467 ; of Howe, 181 

Hallnm, Arthur Henry, subject of Ten- 
nyson's In Memoriam, 467. 

Hallatn, Henry, 467 ; his opinion of 
Skelton, 56 ; of Surrey, 59 ; of Lord 
Brooke, 68 ; of Raleigh, 70 ; of Dray- 
ton, 73; of Hooker, 113; of May, 153; 
of Hahington, 154 ; of Izaak Walton, 
166 ; of Bishop Hall, 169 ; of Jeremy 
Taylor, 173 ; of Bishop Pearson, 174 ; 
of Boyle, 196 ; of Sir William Temple, 
196; of South, 203; of Vanbrugh,226 ; 
of Norris, 243; of Percy's Reliques, 
359; ofHurd, 375; of Bowles, 398. 

Halliwell, James Orchad, 576. 

Halyhurton, Thomas, 258. 

Hamilton, Elizabeth, 342 ; James, 394 ; 
Sir William, 503. 



Hamtnond, Henry, 176; William, a 

hymnist, 136. 
Hampden, Dickson, 586. 
Ha tnpton- Court Conference, 122. 
Handy Andy, by Lover, 534. 
Hanna, William, 595. 
Hanway, Jonas, 365. 
Hare, Julius Charles, 484. 
Harmer, Thomas, 321. 
Harrington, James, 160 ; Sir John, 59. 
Harris, James, 282 ; John, 253, 484. 
Harry, Blind, account of him, 49. 
Harry Esmond, by Thackeray, 525. 
Hart, Joseph, a hymnist, 13C. 
Hartley, David, 244. 
Harvey, Gabriel, 63, 68. 
Haiveis, Thomas, a hymnist, 135. 
Haivices, Robert, 373. 
Haivlzes worth, John, 278. 
HawUins, Sir John, 278. 
Haydon, Benjamin, Robert, 506. 
Hayley, William, 359. 
Hazlitt, William, 409; his opinion of 

Thomson, 219 ; of Mrs. Inchbald, 332; 

of Mrs. Radcliffe, 341: of Goodwin's 

Political Justice, 346: of Sterne, 301; 

of GifFord, 408. 
Head, Sir Francis B., Sir George, 612. 
Heart of Mid Lothian, by Scott, 400. 
Heat a Mode of Motion, by Tyndall, 

561. 
Heber, Reginald, 394; a hymnist, 136. 
Hebrides, a journey to, by Dr. Johnson, 

263. 
Heir of Redely ffe, by Miss Yonge, 539. 
Helps, Arthur, 573. 
Hemans, Mrs. Felicia, 391. 
Henderson, Ebenezer, 483. 
Henry, Matthew, 205 ; Robert, 363. 
Henryson, Robert, 50. 
Herbert of Cherbury, 105 ; George, 76 ; 

William, 503. 
Hermes, by Harris, 282. 
Hermit, The, by Parnell, 218 ; by Gold- 

smitl), 302. 
Herrick, Robert, 149. 
Herschel, Sir John Frederick William, 

471. 
Hervey, James, 318. 
Hervey, Thomas Kibble, 519. 
Hesiod, ti-anslated by Chapman, 92. 
Hey, John, 374. 
Heylin, Peter, 175. 
Hey wood, John, 80. 



INDEX, 



625 



Meyivood, Thomas, 95. 

Hickes, George, 200. 

High Life below Stairs, a Farce, its 
origin, 338. 

Mill, Aaron, 247 ; George, 425 ; Sir John, 
•283. 

mud and Panther, of Dryden, 187. 

Mlstrio-Mastioc, ofPrynne, 158. 

Hohhes, Thomas, 161. 

Mohhouse, Sir Jolin Cam, 438. 

Mojiand, Mr. and Mrs., 503. 

Hogg, James, 395. 

Molienllnden, by Campbell, 384. 

Jiolcroft, Thomas, 330. 

Holland, Lord, 411 ; Lady H., 458 ; Pliile- 
mon, 105. 

Holy Living, Holy Dying, by Jere- 
my Taylor, 172. 

Holy War, Bunyan's, 180. 

Home, John, 337. 

Homer, Chapman's, 92; Pope's, 214; 
Cowpers, 326; Derby's, 550. 

Hone, William, 503. 

Hood, Thomas, 450. 

Hooh, Theodore Edward, 450. 

Hooker, Richard, 113. 

Hoole, John, 334. 

Hope, Pleasures- of, by Campbell, 384. 

Hope, Thomas, 436. 

Hophins, Ezekiel, 206. 

Hopkins, John, 132. 

Horce Paulince, of Paley, 353. 

Home, George, 374 ; Richard Henry, 520 ; 
Thomas Hartwell, 590. 

Horner, Francis, 401. 

Ilorsley, S:t,muel, 352. 

Hours of Idleness, by Byron, 378. 

House o^ Fame, by Chaucer, 38. 

Househo\.d Furniture, by T. Hope, 
436. 

Howard, John, 344. 

Howe, John, 180. 

Hoivell, James, 166. 

Hoivitt, William, Mary, Anna Mary, Mar- 
garet, Richard, 597. 

Hoivson, John S., 484. 

Hudihrns, of Butler, 151. 

Hughes, Thomas, 532 ; John, 221. 

Hume, David, 271. 

Hutnorists, The, by Thackeray, 525. 

HumpJiroy Clinker, by Smollett, 298. 

Hundred Good Folnts of Hus- 
bandry, by Tusser, 59. 

Hunt, James Heni-y Leigh, 466. 

Htmter, Henry, 373. 

53 2 



Huntington,, William, 372. 

Hurd, Bishop, 375. 

Hutcheson, Francis, 244. 

Hutchinson, John, 243. 

Hutton, William, 366. 

Huxley, Thomas Henrj', 558. 

Hyde, Edward. (See Clarendon, 156.) 

Hymnody , English, 129. 

Hymns for Infant Minds, by Anna 

and Jane Taylor, 486. 
Hypatia, by Kingsley, 531. 
Hyperion, by Keats, 383. 

Idylls of the King, by Tennyson, 511. 
II Penseroso, of Milton, 146. 
Image of Death, from Southwell, 77. 
Imagination, Pleasures of, by Aken- 

side, 308. 
Inchbald, Mrs., 332. 
Ingelow, Jean, 521. 
Inglis, Henry David, 442. 
Ingoldsby Legends, 449. 
I}i 3Ieinoriam, by Tennyson, 510. 
Inoculation for small-pox, introduced 

by Lady Montagu, 287. 
Instauratio 3Iagna, of Bacon, 101. 
Interludes, origin and character, 80. 
Irish Jilelodies, by Moore, 380. 
Irving, Edward. 422; Washington, his 

opinion of Goldsmith, 305. 
Itinerary, Leland's, 60. 

rlack Sheppard, by Ainsworth, 535. 

James I., of England, 110, 122. 

James I., of Scotland, his poetry and 
his career, 48, 49. 

James, John Angell, 593 ; G. P. R., 535. 

Jameson, Mrs. Anna, 553. 

Jane Fyre, by Charlotte Bronte, 457. 

Jay, William, 487. 

Jebb, Bishop, 425. 

Jeffrey, Lord, 459 ; opinion of Mrs. Hem- 
ans, 392; of Mrs. Grant of Laggan, 
392 ; of Heber, 395 ; of Maria Edge- 
worth, 402 ; of John Mason Good, 415 ; 
of Montgomery, 451 ; of Barry Corn- 
wall, 515. 

Jennings, David, 292. 

Jenyns, Soame, 282. 

Jerrold, Douglas, 552. 

Jewel, John, Bishop, 110, 

Jew of3Ialta, a play by Marlowe, 83. 

Jewsbury, Maria Jane, 502. 

John Gilpin, Cowper's ballad of, 326. 

John Halifax, by Miss Muloch, 541. 

P 



626 



INDEX. 



tTohnson, Dr. Samuel, 261; his opinion 
of Cowley, 148 ; of Denham, 154 ; of 
Sir Thomas Browne, 162 ; of Roscom- 
mon, 188; ofOtway, 192; of Ambrose 
Philips, 218 ; of Savage, 220 ; of Walsh, 
221 ; of Broome, 222 ; of Isaac Haw- 
kins Browne, 222 ; of Congreve, 225 ; 
of Arbnthnot, 234; of Mallet, 236; of 
De Foe, 242; of Foote, 336 ; of Dr. Blair, 
355; of Elizabeth Carter, 286; of 
Campbell, 293; of Goldsmith, 303; of 
Law's Serious Call, 319. 

J'olmston, James F., 473. 

J'ones, John, 440 ; Sir William, 357; Wil- 
liam, of Nayland, 372. 

tfonsou, Ben, epitaph on Countess of 
Pembroke, 67 ; account of him, 88-90 ; 
his opinion of Lady Digby, 163. 

J'ortin, John, 322. 

tJoseph Andrews, by Fielding, 297. 

JTournalists, 507. 

tToivett, Benjamin, 610. 

JFuniuSf Letters of, 269. 

J^^ust as lam, by Charlotte Elliott, 521. 

tTuventus 3Iiiiidi, by Gladstone, 548. 

names, Lord, 282. 

KavanagJif Julia, 538. 

Kay, Joseph, 548. 

JKeach, Benjamin, 207. 

JLeats, John, 382. 

JLeble, John, 447 ; a hymnist, 136. 

Keith, Alexander, 591. 

Kelly. Thomas, a hymnist, 136. 

Kemble, Mrs. Fanny, 604 ; John Mitchell, 

609 ; John Philip, 334. 
Ken, Thomas, Bishop, 204. 
Kennedy, Grace, 404. 
Keiinett, William, 255. 
Kenrick, William, 294. 
Kent, Chancellor, his opinion of Cobbett, 

412. 
Kiligrew, Sir William, 190. 
Kihnansegg , Miss, by Hood, 450. 
King, Edward, Viscount KingsbO' 

rongJi, 434. 
Kinglahe, Alexander William, 572. 
Kingsley, Charles, 531 ; Henry, 532. 
Kltto, John, 481. 

Knife- €h-inder,'j:h.e, by Canning, 410. 
Knight, Charles, 602 ; his opinion of 

Webster, 94; of John Banks, 193. 
Knight, Henry G., 493 ; Richard Payne, 

439. 
Knowles, Sheridan, 519. 



Knox, John, 110 ; Ticesimus, 437. 
Kyd, Thomas, 84. 

I.ady of 'Lyons, by Bulwer, 626. 

Lady of the Lalce, by Scott, 399. 

J^adfj of the 3Ianor, by Mrs. Sherwood, 
.87. 

Laing, Malcolm, Samuel, 437. 

Lahe district, and poets, 386, 388. 

L> Allegro, of Milton, 146. 

JLanih, Charles, 431 ; his opinion of Shir- 
ley, 97 ; of Fox, 208 ; of Sewel, 212 ; 
of De Foe, 242. 

Lamb, Lady Caroline, 404. 

Lancaster, Duke of, his connection with 
Chaucer and Wyckliffe, 36. 

Lander, Richard, 441 ; t\'illiam, 291. 

Landor, Letitia Elizabeth, Mrs Mac- 
lean, " L. E. L.," 392. 

Landor, Walter Savage, 465 ; his opin- 
ion of Young, 311. 

Langtiage, Science of. Max Mliller, 543. 

Lardner, Dionysius, 473 ; Nathaniel, 
321. 

Latham, Prof. Robert Gordon, 544. 

Latimer, Hugh, account of him, 56 ; ex- 
tract, 61. 

Latin Vulgate. (See Vulgate, 43.) 

Latter Day l^amphlets, by Carlyle, 
542. 

Land, Archbishop, Prayer by him, 127. 

Latirie Todd, by Gait, 405. 

Lavengro, by Borrow, 456. 

Latv, AVilliam, 320 ; Edmund, 319. 

Lay anion, his chronicle of Brutus of 
England, 27-29 ; extract from it, 32-34. 

Layard, A. H., 611. 

Lay of the Last Jlinstrel, by Scott, 
399. 

Lays of Ancient Borne, 565. 

Leake, William Martin, 579. 

Lechy, W. E. H., 555. 

Lee, Harriet and Sophia, 404. 

Lee, Nathaniel, 192. 

Legend, of Brutus of England, 27-29 ; 
Welsh legends, 27. 

Leicester, Earl of, 64. 

Leland, John, 60, 258 ; Thomas, 284. 

Letnon, Mark, 552. 

Lempriere, John, 440. 

Lennox, Mrs. Charlotte, 341. 

Leslie, Charles, 254. 

L' Estrange, Roger, 199. 

Lever, Charles J., 533. 

Leviathan, The, by Hobbes, 161, 



IXDEX, 



627 



JLewes, George Henry, 575. 

Lewis f Sir George Cornewall, 544 ; John, 
il50 ; Blatthew Gregory, " Monk Lew- 
is," 406 ; Mrs. Marian C. Evans, 540. 

Jjeyden, John, 435. 

Lifjht of Nature, Tucker's, 281. 

lAijhts and Shadows of Scottish 
Life, by John Wilson, 462. 

Lindsay, Sir David, early Scotch poet, 52. 

Lingard, John, 488. 

Litani/, The, its composition, 127. 

Literature, denominated from language, 
cot from country. 25, successive liter- 
atures in Britain, 25 ; English L., by 
Craik, 545. 

Little Menry atul his Bearer, by 
Mrs. Sherwood, 487. 

Little's Poems, by Moore, 380. 

Liverpool, Earl of, 349. 

Livingstone, David, 613. 

Living Temple, The, of Howe, 181. 

Lochiel's Warning, by Campbell, 384. 

Loehe, John, 193. 

LocJchart, John Gibson, 464; his opin- 
ion of Burns, 330 ; of Hook, 451. 

LocTisley Hall, by Tennyson, 511. 

Lodge, Thomas, 83. 

Logan, John, 2Sb. 

LogaritJims, invented by Napier, 103. 

Lolnie, De, John Louis, 348. 

London Literary Gazette, its opin- 
ion of Bailey, 516. 

London Quarterly, its opinion of Jere- 
my Taylor, 172 : of Hannah More, 339 ; 
of Chatham, 271 ; of Gibbon, 275 ; of 
Maria Edgeworth, 402; of Beckford, 
406; of Bentham, 417 ; of Robert Hall, 
422; of De Quincej', 464; of Barrows, 
495; of Crabb's Synonyms, 506; of 
Gladstone, 547. 

London Tiines, 014 ; its opinion of Cob- 
bett, 412 ; its editorials by John Ster- 
ling, 499 ; opinion of Disraeli, 528. 

Lord's Prayer, The, the Prymer form 
of it, 127. 

Lothair, by Disraeli, 528. 

Loudon, John Claudius, 501. 

Lovelace, Richard, 165. 

Lover, Samuel, 534. 

Loves oftJie Angels, by Moore, 380. 

Lowndes, W. T., 495 ; his opinion of Be- 
loe, 366. 

Xc «'</<, Bishop, 317. 

LutJier, Prayers by him, in the English 
Prayer-Book, 127; connection with 
modern Hymuody, 131. 



Lyell, Sir Charles, 566. 

I^U^^U; John, 81. 

Lynch, Thomas Tuke, a hymnist, 137. 

Lyra Germanica, 137. 

Lyrical Ballads, by Wordsworth and 

Coleridge, 444. 
Lyte, Henry Francis, hymnist, 136. 
Lyttleton, Lord, 285. 
Lytton, (Bulwer,) 526. 

3Iacaulny, Catherine, Rev. Aulay, 343. 

IMacaulay,1\wmA^ Babington,564 ; his 
opinion of Milton, 145, 146 ; of Claren- 
don, 157 ; of Charles I., 166 ; of Eun- 
yan, 180; of L'Estrange, 299; of Til- 
lotson, 203; of Wycherley, 225; of 
Jeremy Collier, 2i9 ; of Addison, 230 ; 
of Sprat, 248 ; of Johnson, 266 ; of Bos- 
■well, 265 ; of Fanny Burney, 340 ; of 
Wilkes, 281 ; of Psalmanazar, 286 ; of 
Leigh Hunt, 466 ; of Ilallam, 467 ; tilt 
■with Croker, 470 ; of Wilberforce, 478. 

llcCric, Thomas, 480. 

MacCulloch, John Ramsay, 547. 

MacBiarmid, John, 437. 

JIacDonald, Andrew, 314. 

McGavin, William, 427. 

3IacUay, Alexander, 606 ; Charles, 519. 

JIachenzie, Henry, 345 ; R. Shelton, his 
edition of Maginn's Miscellanies, 46S ; 
Sir George, 200. 

3Iac7cintosh, Sir James, 408; his opinion 
of Hobbes, 161 ; of Fox, 208 ; of Shaftes- 
bury, 235; of Berkeley, 238; of Char- 
din, 251 ; of Butler, 254 ; of Leslie, 256 ; 
of Adam Smith, 351 ; of Fox, 268 ; of 
Thomas Brown, 413 ; of Bentham, 416 ; 
of Brewstei", 556. 

Mc Knight, James, 373. 

MdcXish, Robert, 438. 

3Iac2iherson, James, 277. 

Madden, Sir Frederick, 576; edits the 
Brut of Layamon, 27 ; and Wyckliflfe's 
Bible, 44. 

Madden, Richard R., 611. 

Magee, William, 425. 

Maginn, William, 467. 

MaJion, Lord, 571. 

Mahony, Francis, " Father Prout," 468. 

Malcolm, Sir John, 440. 

Mallet, David, 313. 

3Ialone, Edmund, 294. 

3ralthus, Thomas Robert, 417. 

3Landeville, Bernard, 247. 

Mandeville, Sir John, account of him, 
45. 



628 



INDEX. 



Manning, Miss Ann, author of "Mary 

Powell" books, 597. 
3Zannin{/f Archbishop, 582. 
Manninff, Robert. (See Robert of 

Brunne, 31.) 
JJHan of Feeling, The, by Mackenzie, 

3i3. 
3Iansel, H. L., 554. 
3Iansfield, Lord, 270. 
Alnnt, Bishop, 481 ; a hymnist, 137. 
Mantell, Gideon Algernon, 473. 
Manton, Thomas, 184. 
3Iarcet, Mrs. Jane, 507. 
Marhliani, Mrs., 507. 
Marlowe, Christopher, 83. 
Marniion, by Scott, 399. 
Marot, Clement, his version of the 

Psalms, 131. 
Marryat, Capt. Frederick, 455. 
3Iarsden, William, 420. 
Marsli, Catherine, 539 ; Herbert, 481. 
Mai^ston, John, 92. 
Martineau, Harriet, 603 ; James, 604. 
Marvell, Andrew, 165. 
Mary Harton, by Mrs. Gaskell, 541. 
Mary fowell SooJcs, by Miss Man- 
ning, 597. 
Mashell, "William, his account of the 

Prj'mer, 125. 
Mason, John, 321, 134 ; William, 306. 
3Iassey, Gerald, 518. 
Mftssiiiger, Philip, 94. 
3Insso}i, David, 574. 
Matthew, Thomas, his version of the 

Bible, 118. 
Maturin, Charles Robert, 406. 
Matid, by Tennyson, 511. 
Maurice, John P. D., 585; Thomas, 

368. 
Mavor, William, 507. 
May, Thomas, 153. 
MayJiew Brothers, 605. 
3Iedwin, Thomas, 438. 
MeUnoth, William, 284. 
Melville, Henry, 593. 
Memory, Pleasures of, by Rogers, 384. 
Mereditli, Owen, E. R. Bulwer-Lytton, 

522. 
Meres, Francis, 103. 
Merivale, Charles, 567. 
Merle and Nightingale, a poem, by 

Dunbar, 50. 
Mermaid, The, a famous tavern among 

the old dramatists, S9. 
Merrick, James, a hymnist, 136. 
Messiah, The, by Pope, 214. 



Metrical Romances, their introduction 
and prevalence in England, 31, 32. 

Micliey Free, by Lever, 533. 

Mickle, William Junius, 314. 

Middle Ages, Hallam's, 467. 

Middleton, Conyers, 240; Thomas, 92; 
Thomas Fansliawe, Bishop, 423. 

Midshipman Easy, by Marryat, 456. 

Milman, Henry Hart, 567 ; opinion of 
Wyckliffe, 44; of Gibbon, 274. 

Mill, James, 545 ; his opinion of Dugald 
Stewart, 41.3. 

Mill, John Stuart, 546. 

Miller, Hugh, 472 ; his opinion of Brew- 
ster, 556. 

Jliller, John, .348. 

3Iill on tJie Floss, by Miss Evans, -541. 

Milner, John, 426. 

Milnes, Joseph, 374. 

3Iilnes, Richard Moncktou, 517. 

Milton, John, 141 ; how affected by the 
cathedral chants, 130. 

3Iinstrel, The, by Beattie, 328. 

Minute Philosopher, The, by Berke- 
ley, 238. 

Miracle Flays, 79. 

3£irrour for Magistrates, by Sack- 
ville, 70. 

3Iisogonus, one of the earliest English 
comedies. SO. 

3£itc7iell, Thomas, 505. 

3Iitfai^d, Mary Russell, 454. 

3Iitford, William, 433. 

3Iodern Painters, by Ruskin, 542. 

3Ioir, David Macbeth, 470; his opinion 
of Elizabeth Laudou, 393 ; of Heber, 
394; of Hood, 450; of Hook, 461; of 
Montgomery, 451; of T. H. Baylej', 
452 ; of Motherwell, 452 ; of Mrs Nor- 
ton, 514; of Alaric Watts, 514; of 
Milnes, 517. 

3Tonboddo, Lord, 356. 

3Ionniouth, Geoffrey, 28. 

3IonU, The, by Lewis, 406. 

Montagu, Basil, 501. 

3Iontagu, Lady Mary, Elizabeth, 2S7. 

3Lontgomery , James, 451; a hj-mnist, 
136. 

31ontgomery , Robert, 451. 

3Ioonsto}ie, by Wilkie Collins, 535. 

3Ioore, Edward, 253. 

3Ioore, John, 365. 

3Ioore, Thomas, 379. 

3Ioralities, or Moral Plays, 79. 

More, Hannah, 338. 



INDEX. 



629 



More, Henry, 177, 

Irlore, Sir Tliomiis, account of him, Si. 

3Iorel, J. D., 554. 

Moi-gnn, Lady Sydney, 454. 

3Iorland, Sir Samuel, 199. 

Slorris, William, 522. 

3Io}'rison, Robert, 420. 

3Iotherivell, William, 452. ■ 

3Loxon, Edward, 517. 

3Iudie, Robert, 502. 

Miiller, Max, 543. 

Miilock, Dinah Maria, 541. 

JZunchauseiif Baron, 288. 

Mandfuj, Anthony, 96. 

Jlnve, William, 544. 

Murphy, Arthur, 335. 

Murphy, James Cavanah, 436. 

Murray, Charles Augustus, 611. 

JIurray, Lindley, 362, 

Music, History of, by Dr. Burnej', 340. 

Mysteries of JJdolpho, by 31rs. Rad- 

cliffe, 341. 
My Novel, by Bulwer, 526. 

JSfamby Pauiby, first used by Pope, 218. 
N4tpier, John, lUJ; Sir W. R., 570. 
Nash, Thomas, 81. 
Natural History of Entliusiasm, 

by Isaac Taylor, 4:6. 
Neal, Daniel, 259. 
Neale, John Mason, a hymnist, 137. 
Needham, John, a hymnist, 135. 
Never too Late to Mend, by C. Reade, 

530. 
Netvconie, William, 374. 
Newconies, The, by Thackeray, 525. 
Newman, John Henry, 579, 137 ; Francis 

William, 585. 
Neivtoti, Sir Isaac, 244. 
Neu'tou, John, 327 ; a hymnist, 136. 
Newton, Thomas, 321. 
New Way to Jfay Old Debts, by Mas- 

siugei", 9-1:. 
New World of Words, by Edward Phil- 
lips, 167. 
Nicliol, John Pringle, 472. 
Nicholas, John, 434. 
Nicholas, Sir Harris, 492. 
Nicholas Nickelhy, by Dickens, 524. 
NiyJit TJioayhts, by Young, 310. 
Noctes JLmb ros iance, by Wilson, 

"Christopher North," 462. 
Noel, Baptist, 592. 
Nonnan-French, its literature, 25; its 

influence on tlie English, 26. 
Nor r is, John, 212. 
58* 



NortJi JLmerican Review, its opinion 

of Thomas Brown, 414. 
North liritish Heview, its opinion of 

John Foster, 466; of Chalmers, 475; 

of Mrs. Browning, 513. 
North Briton, by John Wilkes, 280. 
Nortlicote, James, 436. 
Norton, Mrs. Caroline Elizabeth Sarah, 

513. 
Novum Organum, of Bacon, 101. 
Nugent, Thomas, 294. 



Oceana, Harrington's, 160. 

OcMey, Simon, 248. 

Ogilby, John, 167. 

O'Keefe, John, 398. 

Old Manor House, by Charlotte Smith, 

342. 
Oldniixoti, John, 248. 
Old Mortality, by W. Scott, 408. 
Old Med Sandstone, by Hugh Miller, 

472. 
Oldys, William, 290. 
Oliphant, Mrs. Margaret, 540. 
Oliver, George, 608. 
Olney Hymns, 326, 328. 
O'Meara, Barry Edward, 438. 
Omnipresence of the Deity, by 

Montgomery, 451. 
Ox>ie, Amelia, 454. 
0±>ium-Eater, Confessions of, by De 

Quince}', 463. 
Origines Sacrce, by Stillingfleet, 203. 
Orley Farm, by Trollope, 529. 
Orme, Robert, S04. 
Oi'Hie^ William, 495; his opinion of Owen, 

179; of Howe, 181; of Ken, 204; of 

Hutchinson, 243 ; of Blayney, 361 ; of 

John Mason Good, 415 ; of Middleton, 

423. 
Ormulum, its history and character, 

29, 30. 
Orrery, R. Boyle, Earl of, 189, 240. 
Orton, Job, 321. 
Ossian, his poems, 277. 
Otway, Thomas, 191. 
Overbury, Sir Thomas, 73. 
Owen, John, 178; Richard, 559. 

Paine, Thomas, 344. 

Pahiugton, Lady Dorothy, 168. 

Paley, AVilliam, 3.i3. 

Palgrave, Sir Francis, 570. 

Palladis Trtmt«, of Francis Meres, 103. 

Palmer, Roger, 201. 



630 



INDEX 



Palmer, Sir Roundell, 607. 

l*,tmela, by Richardson, 295. 

Pantalogia, by Olinthus Gregory and 
J. M. Good, 415. 

Fantisocracy , of Southey and Cole- 
ridge, 385, .388. 

Faradise Lost, and Paradise Me- 
gnitied, 145. 

Par doe, Julia, 537. 

P,trents' Assistant, by Maria Edge- 
worth, 401. 

Parisina, by Byron, 379. 

PiirU, Mungo, 440. 

ParUer, Archbishop, 121. 

I'arUJtiirst, John, 375. 

Parnell, Thomas, 218. 

Parr, Samuel, 438. 

Parry, Sir W. Edward. 611. 

Parsons, Robert, the Jesuit, 116. 

Passions, Ode on, by Collins, 307. 

Passions, Plays on, by Joanna Baillle, 
396. 

Paston TjCtters, The, 343. 

Patniore, Coventry, 518. 

Patrick, Symon, 204. 

Patriot King, Idea of, by Bolingbroke, 
236. 

Pearson^ Bishop, 173. 

Peele, George, 83. 

Peerage, The, by Burke, 493. 

Pegge, Samuel, 368. 

Peg Woffington, by C. Reade, 530. 

PelJiain, by Bulwer, 526. 

Pembroke, Countess of, 67. 

Pendennis, Major, by Thackeray, 525. 

Penington, Isaac. 211. 

Penn, Granville, John, 501. 

Penn, William, 210, 

Pennant, Thomas, 365. 

Pepys, Samuel, 198. 

Percy Anecdotes, 440. 

Percy, Thomas, Bishop, 358. 

Peregrine Pickle, by Smollett, 298. 

Perronet, Edward, hyranist, 136. 

Peter Hell, by Wordsworth, 445.. 

Peter Porcupine, a pseudonym of Wil- 
liam Cobbett, 411. 

Peter, William, 506. 

Petrarch, supposed meeting with Chau- 
cer, 37. 
Pettigretv, Thomas Joseph, 579. 
Petty, Sir William, 161. 
Phalaris, Epistles of, 236. 
Philip, Robert, 593. 
Philips, Ambrose, 217. 
PJiiUps, John, 191. 



Phillips, George Searle, .508. 
Phillips, John and Edward, nephews of 

Milton, 141, 166. 
Phillips, Thomas, 323. 
Philosophical Language, by Bishop 
Wilkins, 163. 

Physical Theory of Another TAfe, 
by Isaac Taylor, 486. 

Pickering, Ellen, 455. 

Pickwick Papers, by Dickens, 523. 

Piers Plowman, a description of the 
work, 41, 42. 

Pike, Samuel, 321. 

Pilgrim's Progress, Bunyan's, 179. 

Pillans, James, 607. 

rindar, Peter, 331. 

PinUerton, John, 578. 

Piozzi, Mrs., 3-39. 

Pippa Passes, by Browning, 512. 

Pitt, William, 271. 

Pitts, John, 110. 

Plain Dealer, The, by Wycherley, 224. 

Piny fair, John, 418. 

Poesie, Defense of, 65. 

Politicftl Justice, Godwin's, 345, .346. 

Pollok, Robert, 396. 

Poly-Olbion, poem by Drayton, 73. 

Pomfret, John, 191. 

Poole, Matthew, 181. 

Pojie, Alexander, 213; his opinion of 
Cowley, 148 ; of J. Beaumont, 191 ; of 
Walsh, 221 ; of Arbuthnot, 234. 

Parson, Richard, 3''.0. 

Porter, Sir James, 288. 

Porter, Jane, 536; Anna Maria, Sir Rob- 
ert Ker, 53(i. 

Porteus, Beilby, 375. 

Potter, John, 249 ; Robert, 360, 

Powell, Baden, 586. 

Powell, Mary, wife of Milton, 141. 

Power, Margaret A., 403. 

Power, Philip Bennett, 594. 

Pownal, Thomas, 349. 

Practical Vietv of Christianity, by 
Wilberfoi'ce, 478. 

Praed, Wintlirop Mackworth, 452. 

Prnyer-Book, The English, 124. 

PreJiistoric Man, by Daniel Wilson, 
561. 

Prelude, The, by Wordsworth, 444. 

Prescott, W. H., his opinion of Johnson, 
264. 

Price, Richard, 353. 

Prichard, James Cowley, 471. 

Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen, 



\ 



INDEX 



631 



Prideaux, Humphrey, 204. 

JPrlestley, Joseph, 351. 

J^rinier, The New England, 125. 

I'i'ince of Dreamers, applied to Bun- 
yan, 179. 

T'rincess, The, by Tenuvson, 510. 

frinting, Art of, its effect oil author- 
ship, 53. 

rriot-, Sir James, 574; Matthew, 216. 

I'risoiier of Cltillon, The, by Byron, j 
379. 

J'rocter, Adelaide, 515. 

I'roctei'f Bryan Waller, "Barry Corn- 
wall," 514. 

r.'Oiii, Father. (See Mahony, 468.) 

i'rovet'blal I'hilosopJii/ , by Tupper, 
602. 

T'rynne, William, 158. 

rrymer, The, 1-5. 

Jfsaltnanazftr, George, 286. 

J^salm-Siiiffing in Geneva, and in 
England, 131. 

IFugin, Augustus Welby, 608. 

I'lilteney, William, -38, 239. 

J^nrcJias, Samuel, 109. 

l^urple Island, a poem by Phineas 
Fletcher, 75. 

Purvey, Richard, a disciple of Wyckliffe, 
43. 

JPtisey, Edward Bouverie, 584. 

Pye, Henry James, 335. 

Quair, The King's, a poem by James I., 

49 
Quaker Poet, The, Bernard Barton, 402. 
Qiicirles, Francis John, 153. 
Queen Mab, by Shelley, 381. 
Queen's English, by Alford, 591, 
Queen's Wake, by Hogg, 395. 
Quin, Michael, 508. 
Quincu)ixial Jjozenge, of Sir Thomas 

Browne, 162. 

IRah and Sis Friends, by John 

Brown, 007. 
Jtadcliffe, Mrs. Anna, 341. 
Pafflcs, Sir Thomas Stamford, 439. 
Jlfiinolds, John, 114, 122. 
Maleigh, Sir Walter, connection with 

Spenser, 64 ; account of him, 68, 69. 
Palph, James, 281. 
JtaljiJi Poyster Doyster, the first 

English comedy, 80. 
Panihler, The, by Dr. Johnson, 2G3. 
Panisay, Allan, 309. 
MandolpJi, Thomas, 96. 



Pajie of Ziicrece, by Shakespeare, 85. 
li<fj}e of the Lock, by Pope, 214. 
liasjye, Kudolph, author of Munchau- 
sen's Travels, 288. 
Jtasselas, by Dr. Johnson, 263. 
Hawlinson, George, 5G9; Henry C, 570. 
Raivso}i, George, a hymnist, 137. 
Ray, John. 198. 

jReade, Charles, 5£0 ; William W., 531. 
Reed, Andrew, a hymnist, 136. 
Reed, Isaac, 295. 
Pees's Cyclojicedia, 253. 
PeJieorsal, The, by the Duke of Buck- 
ingham, 1^6. 
Peid, Capt. Mayne, 531 ; Thomas, 354. 
Reign of Latv, by Duke of Argyle, 556. 
Pejected A^ddresses, by Horace and 

James Smith, 469. 
Peligio ILaici, by Dryden, 187. 
Peligio Medici, by Sir Thos. Browne, 

162. 
Peliques of Ancient Poetry, Per- 
cy's, 358. 
Pennell, Major James, 442. 
Petrospective Pevieiv, o-pminu of Tho- 
mas Fuller, 171; of De Foe, 242; of 
Glover, 337. 
Peynolds, Edward, 183. 
Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 279. 
PIieitns-Douay version of the Bible, 

121. 
Phytning Chi-onicles, origin, 28; Laya- 
mon's, 28; Robert of Gloucester's, 30; 
Robert of Brunne's, 31. 
Picardo, David, 417. 
PlcJi, Claudius James, 442. 
Richardson, Charles, 609. 
Richardson, Jonathan. 247. 
Richardson, Samuel, 295. 
Richmond, Legh, 425. 
Rights ofJlan, The, by Thomas Paine, 

345. 
Ping and Pook, The, by Browning, 512. 
Rise and Progress, Doddridge's, 257. 
Ritchie, Leitch, 536. 
Pitson, Joseph, 358. 
Rivals, The, by Sheridan, 335. 
Robe ft of Pru>ine, his Chronicle, 31. 
Robert of Gloucester, an account of 

his Chronicle, 30. 
Pobcrtson, F. W , 587. 
Pobertson, William, 275. 
Robinson, Henry Crabb, 605. 
Pobinson Crusoe, by De Foe, 241. 
Robinson, Robert, 320. 
Pob Roy, by Scott, 400. 



632 



IXDEX 



Moche, Regiua Maria, 404. 

Mock of A.yes, by Toplady, 372. 

lioderick Rnndotn, by Smollett, 298. 

Hofjers, Heury, 593 ; his opinion of ilar- 
vell, 165. 

Hogers, John, his version of the Bible, 
118. 

MogerSf Samuel, 384. 

Jtoget, Peter Mark, 559. 

Holt, Richard, 292. 

JRoniaine, William, 375. 

Somaunt oftJie Rose, 38. 

Moniilli/, Sir Samuel, 411. 

Koscoe, William Thomas, 432. 

Jtoscoinnion, Earl of, 188. 

Hose, William Stewart, 505 ; Hugh James, 
506. 

JRoss, Alexander, 152 ; Sir John, 611. 

Hossetti, Christina G., 521. 

Mouse, Francis, his Version of the 
Psalms, 133, 152. 

Moive, Mrs. Elizabeth, 246; a hymuist, 
134; Nicholas. 218. 

Mowlnnds, Samuel, 75. 

Mowlet/, William, 94. 

Moijnl Society, founded, 195, 197, 198. 

MnsUiii, John, 542. 

Miissell, Earl, 549; Michael, 490; Wil- 
liam, 363. 

Miissell, William II., Special Correspond- 
ent of London Times, 613. 

Mntherford, Samuel, 182. 

Mydal 3Lou}it, the residence of Words- 
worth, 445. 

Mylnnd, John, a hymnist, 136. 

Mi/nier, Thomas, 253. 

Snhhnth, The, by Grahame, 330. 

Saclinrissa, by Waller, 147. 

SncTxville, Thomas, Earl of Dorset, 70. 

Saints' Mest, Baxters, 178. 

Sain, Augustus, €06. 

Salathiei, by Croly, 448. 

Sale, George, 249. 

Saluiasius, controversy with Milton, 

144. 
Salmon, Thomas, 248. 
Samson A^gonistes, 145. 
Sandeman, Robert, 322. 
Sanders, John, 111. 
Sandys, George, 107. 
Sanscrit, Sir William Jones, 357; Sir 

Charles Wilkins, 419; Max Muller, 

543: Hay man Wilson, 563; Monier 

Williams, 564. 
Sartor Mesartus, by Carlyle, 542. 



Satiro-JIastix, by Decker, 93. 

Savage, Richard, 220. 

Snville, Sir Henry, 104. 

Saxon. (See Anglo-Saxon.) 

Schlegel, A. W., his opinion of Ben Jon- 
son, 90. 

ScJionberg - Cotta Hooks, by Mrs. 
Charles, oy6. 

Scliool-Books, 507. 

Schoolmaster, The, by Roger Aschum, 
101. 

Schoolmistress, The, by Shenstone, 308. 

Scoreshy, William, 6il. 

Scotch, early poets, 47-52. 

Scott, John, 314; Jonathan, 2«9 ; Michael, 
406 ; Thomas, a hymnist, 135 ; Thomas, 
the commentator, 420; Reginald, 102. 

Scott, Sir Walter, 399 ; description of 
Gawin Douglas, 51; his opinion of 
Rowlands, 75 ; of Lily's Euphues, 81 ; 
of Dryden, 187, IBS ; of Evelyn, 197 ; 
of Grahame, 331 ; of Elizabeth Hamil- 
ton, 342; of Godwin's Life of Chaucer, 
347 ; of Ritson, 358 ; of Percy's Re- 
liques, 359; of Ferriar and Sterne, 
369; of Fielding, 298; pf Goldsmith, 
306 ; of Chatterton, 316 ; of Mrs. Grant 
of Laggan, 392 ; of Maria Edgeworth, 
402 ; of Miss Ferrier, 403 ; of GifFord, 
40S; of Jeffrey, 459; of Cunningham,101. 

SeottisJi Chiefs, by Jane Porter, 537. 

Scrihlerus Club, 234. 

Seagrave, Robert, a hymnist, 136. 

Seasons, The, by Thomson, 219. 

Seeker, Archbishop. 255. 

Sedgeivick, Daniel, a hymnist, 136. 

Sedley, Sir Charles, 192. 

Seeley, John Robert, Professor, 587. 

Sejanus, by Ben Jonson, 89. 

Selden, John, 158. 

Semi-Detached House, and Semi-At- 
tached Couple, by Lady Eden, 551. 

Senior, Nassau William, 548. 

Sentimental Journey, by Sterne, 300. 

Seven Lamps of JLrchizecture, by 
Ruskin, 542. 

Seicel, William, 212. 

Sewell, Elizabeth, 539. 

ShadweJl, Thomas, 192. . 

Shaftesbury, Earl of, 234. 

SJiakesi^eare, William, 84-88; Greene's 
reference to him, 82; Editors, 294. 

Sharp, Granville, 349. 

Sharjye, Samuel, 577. 

Shatv, Thomas B., 607 ; his opinion of 
Mrs. TroUope, 529. 



INDEX. 



633 



Shee, Martin Archer, 507. 

Sheffield, John, 2i8. 

Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 380; Mrs. Mary 
WoUstonecraft Shelley, 382. 

Sheiistone, William, 308. 

Shepherd, Mrs. Anne, 597. 

Shepherd of Salisburi/ l*lain, by 
Hannah More, 339. 

Shepherds' Calendar, by Spenser, 64. 

Sheppard, Elizabeth S., 538. 

Sheridan, Richard Briusley, 336; 
Thomas, 335 ; Mrs. Frances, 336. 

Sherley brothers, 107. 

Sherloch, Thomas, 254. 

Sherwood, Mrs. Mary M., 487. 

Ship of Fools, poem by Barclay, 57. 

SlLipw7'eck, The, by Falconer, 312. 

Shifley, James, 96. 

Shirley, "Walton, a hymnist, 136. 

Shobefl, Frederick, 503. 

SJiuckford, Samuel, 205. 

Sidney, Algernon, 197. 

Sidney, Sir Philip,' 64-67. 

Simeon, Charles, 479. 

Simpson, David, 376. 

Sinclair, Catherine, 538 ; Rt. Hon. John, 
411. 

Singer, Samuel Weller, 494, 

Skelton, John, a poet, 56. 

Smart, Benjamin H., 507: Christopher, 
284. 

Smedley, Edward, 502. 

Smedley, Francis E., 536. 

Sniellie, William, 344. 

Smiles, Samuel, 574. 

Smith, Adam, 350; Albert, 606; Mrs. 
Charlotte, 342 ; Goldwiu, 548; Horace 
and James, 469 ; Capt. John, 106 ; John 
Pye, 479 ; Miles, 114, 123 ; Sydney, 457 ; 
his opinion of Bentham, 105, 416; 
Thomas Soutlnvood, 561 ; William, 284. 

SmitJi's Dictionaries, 610. 

Smollett, Tobias George, 298. 

Smyth, William, 491. 

Somers, Lord John, 2S8. 

Somerville, Mrs. Mary, 558. 

Song of the Shirt, by Hood, 450. 

Sonnets, first written in English by Sur- 
rey, 5S. 

South, Robert, 203. 

Soiithamjiton, Earl of, patron of Shake- 
speare. 85. 

Soittherno, Thomas, 227. 

Southey, Jlrs. Caroline, 387. 

Soathey, Robert, 385; his opinion of 
Colhns, 307; of Churchill, 309; of 



Kirke White, 383; of Hartley Cole- 
ridge, 389. 
Southwell, Robert, 71 ; extract, 77. 
Spalding , William, 551. 
Spectator, The, by Addison, 229. 
Spectator, The London, its opinion of 

Aytoun, 517. 
Specultun Meditantis, by Gower, 40. 
Speke, John Hanning, 613. 
Spelman, Edward, 249. 
Spence, Joseph, 283 ; anecdote of Wycher- 

ley, 224. 
Spencer, Herbert, 505. 
Spenser, Edmund, 63-65. 
Splendid SJiilling, The, of J. Philips, 

191. 
Sptotiswood, John, 106. 
Sprat, Thomas, 247. 
Spnrgeon, Charles H., 592. 
Spurzlieim, Johmun Gaspar, 418. 
StackJiouse, Thomas, 255. 
Stanhope, Lady Hester, 502. 
Stanihurst, Richard, 112. 
Stanley, Dean, 587 ; Thomas, 166. 
Star of Bethlehem, by Kirke White, 

383. 
Steele, Anne, a hymnist, 135, 314; Sir 

Richard, 230. 
Steevens, George, 294. 
Stella, a lady-love of Swift's, 233. 
Stennett, Joseph, a hymnist, 134. 
Stennett, Samuel, a hymnist, 135. 
Stephen, Sir James, 549. 
Stephens's Thesaurus, edition by 

Valpys, 504, 505. 
Sterling, John, 499. 
Sterne, Lawrence, 300. 
Sternhold and Hopkins, Yersion of 

the Psalms. 132. 
Steivart, Dugald, 412 ; his opinion of Bar- 
row, 174 ; of Boyle, 196 ; of Glanville, 

200. 
Still, John, Bishop, a writer of comedy, 

80. 
Still ingfleet, Edward, 203. 
Stirling, Earl of, William Alexander, 77. 
Stirling, William, 573. 
Stones of Venice, by Ruskin, 542. 
Stow, John, 109. 
Strawberry Mill, Horace Walpole's 

place, 279. 
Strickland, Agnes, 568; Jane, Susan- 
! UMh, Catherine, Samuel, 569. 

Struthers, John, 518. 
Strutt, Joseph, 36S. 
Strype, John, 255. 



634 



INDEX. 



Stuart and Jtevett, 3G0. 

StiKirt, Gilbert, 285. 

/Sublime and lieautiful, The, of 
Burke, 266. 

Suckliiiff, Sir John, 150. 

Sunnier, John Bird, Archbishop of Can- 
terbury, 588. 

Sunday -School Books, 596. 

Surrey, Earl of, 58. • 

Swain, Charles, 516. 

Swift, Jonathan, 232 ; his opinion of Ar- 
buthnot, 234. 

Swinburne, Algernon Charles, 521. 

Sylva, Evelyn's, 197. 

Sylvester, Joshua, 7-4. 

Synonyms, by Crabb, 506. 

Synopsis, Pooles, 181. 

System of the Universe, Cudworth's, 
174. 

Tabard Inn, Soutluvark, the place of 

meeting of the Canterbury Pilgrims, 

37. 
Talfourd, Sir Thomas Noon, 516; his 

opinion of Caleb Williams, 346. 
Tale of a Tub, The, by Swift, 232. 
Tales of a Grandfather, by W. Scott, 

400. 
Tar Water, Berkeley's essay about it, 

238. 
Task, The, by Co^vper, 327. 
Tasso, translated by Fairfax, 73. 
Tate and Brady, version of the Psalms, 

133. 
Tatler, The, 230, 231. 
Taut/tfioeus, The Baroness, 538. 
Tavern life of the early di-amatists, 99. 
Taylor, Jeremy, 173; a hymnist, 134; 

Thomas, The Platonist, 498 ; John, the 

Water-Poet, 152; Tom, 516; William, 

of Norwich, 499. 
Taylors of Ongar, Isaac, Ann, Jane, 

485. 
Te Beuni, The, beautifully translated, 

128. 
Temporal Mission of the Holy 

Ghost, by Archbishop Manning, 582. 
Temple, Sir William, 196. 
Temple, The, by Herbert, 76. 
Tennent, James Emerson, 550. 
Tennyson, Alfred, 509. 
Ten Thousand a Year, by Warren, 

534. 
Thackeray, Anno Elizabeth, 526. 
Thackeray, W. M., 524; his opinion of 

Prior, 216 ; of Congreye, 225 ; of Field- 



ing, 288; of Smollett, 299 ; of Southey, 
387. 

Thaddeus of Warsaw, by Jane Por- 
ter, 537. 

Theobald, Lewis, 247. 

TJie Shorter Catechism, 128. 

The Three Warnings, by Mrs. Piozzi, 
339. 

Thirlwall, Connop, 572. 

Thistle and Base, a poem by Dunbar, 
50. 

Thoms, William J., 577. 

Tiiomson, Andrew, 423 ; James, 219 ; 
Mrs. Katherine, 538 ; William, Arch- 
birshop of York, 588 ; Thomas, 473, 

Thompson, Thomas P., 547. 

Thornbury, George W., 606. 

Thorndike, Herbert, 177. 

TJiornton, Bonnell. 313. 

Tliorpe, Benjamin, 576. 

Thrale, Mrs , 339. 

Three Estates, Play of, by Lindsay, 52. 

Tlvunderer, The, applied to the London 
Times, 614. 

Tickell, Thomas, 220. 

Tiyhe, Mrs. May, 332. 

Tillotson, John, 202. 

Tilton, Theodore, his opinion of Mrs. 
Browning, 513. 

Times, The London, 614. 

Tindal, Matthew, 245 ; Nicholas, 246. 

Tittlebat Titmouse, in Ten Thousand a 
Year, by Warren, 534. 

Todd, Henry John, 492. 

Toland, John, 245. 

Tom Brown's ScJiool-Days at Rug- 
by, and at Oxford, by Hughes, 533. 

Tom Cringle's Bog, by Michael Scott, 
406. 

Tom (Tones, by Fielding, 288. 

Tomline, George Prettyman, Bishop, 423. 

Tomnoddy, Lord, 449. 

Tone, Theobald Wolfe, 348. 

Tonna, Mrs. Charlotte Elizabeth, 487. 

Tooke, Home, 356; William, 356. 

Toplady, Augustus, 374; a hymnist, 136. 

Toxophilus, by Roger Ascham, 101. 

Tractates, by Milton, 144. 

Tracts for the Times, 476. 

Traveller, The, by Goldsmith, 303. 

Travels, 611. 

Tregelles, Samuel P.. 592. 

Trench, Richard Chevenix, 590. 

Trimmer, Mrs. Sarah, 343. 

Tristram Shandy, by Sterne, 300. 



INDEX 



635 



Troilus and Creseide, a poem by 
Cliaucer, 38. 

Trollops, Mrs. Frances, 528 ; Anthony, 
Thomas Adolphos, 529. 

Tron Church, Tlie, occupied by Chal- 
mers, 475. 

Troy, its story connected with that of 
Britain, 27. 

Truth, essay on, by Beattie, 328. 

Tucker, Abraliam, 281. 

Tuckerniau, Henry T., his opinion of 
Hazlitt, 410 ; of Maginn, 468. 

Talloch, John, 596. 

Tapper, Martin F., 602. 

Turner, Sharon, 491. 

Tusser, Thomas, 59. 

TwicJcenham, the residence of Pope, 
214. 

Twiss, Sir Travers, 547. 

Twisse, William, 182. 

Two Married Women and Widows, 
by Dunbar, 60. 

Tyndale, William, his version of the 
Bible, 116. 

Tyndall, John, 566. 

Tyrwhitt, Thomas, 283 ; discovered the 
Ormulum to be in verse, 29. 

Tytler, James, 346; William, 363 ; Alex- 
ander F., 490 ; Patrick Frazer, 491. 

Wdall, Nicholas, writer of the first Eng- 
lish comedy, 80. 

JTncle Toby, in Tristram Shandy, 300. 

Vntvin, Mary, her relations to Cowper, 
327. 

Vrquhart, David, 550. 

JJsher, James, 169. 

Utopia, a philosophical romance, by Sir 
Thomas More, 54. 

Valpy, Richard, E. J., Ab. J., Edward, 504. 

Vanbruf/Ii, Sir John, 225, 

Vancouver, George, 365. 

Vane, Sir Harry, 164. 

Vanessa, a lady-love of Swift, 233. 

Vanity Fair, by Thackeray, 521. 

Varina, a lady-love of Swift, 233. 

Vatheh, by Beckford, 405. 

Vauffhan, Henry, 190 ; Robert, 571 ; 
Robert Alfred, 572. 

Vetius and Adonis, by Shakespeare, 85. 

Versification of Layamon's Chi'onicle, 
28 ; of the Ormulnm, ;10 ; of Robert of 
Gloucester's, 31 ; hlmilc vrrse, 58. 

Vicar of Wakefield, by (iohlsmith, 302, 

Villette, by Charlotte Broate, 457. 



Virgil, his story of Troy connected with 
that of Britain, 27 ; ^neid first trans- 
lated by G. Douglas, 51 ; translated by 
Surrey, 58. 

Vision of William concerning Piers 
Plowman, 41. 

Vivian Grrey, by Disraeli, 528. 

Vode. Claniantis, by Gower, 40. 

Vulgate, Latin, the basis of Wyckliffe's 
version, 43. 

Wace, Norman-French Chronicler, 28. 

Wake, William, 255. 

Wakefield, Gilbert, 359. 

Walker, John, 361. 

Wall, William, 207. 

Wallace, Sir Alfred Russell, 612. 

Wallace, Sir William, a poem by Blind 

Harry, 49. 
Waller, Edmund, 146 ; his opinion of 

Denham, 154. 
Wallis, John, 198. 
Walpole, Horace, 279. 
Walsh, William, 221. 
Walton, Iziiak, 165. 
Warhurton, Bishop, 316; Elliot B. E., 

536. 
Ward, Robert Plumer, 499 ; Thomas, 207 ; 

William George, 583. 
Wardlaw, Ralph, 480. 
Warner, William, author of Albion's 

England, 71. 
Wai're}i Hastings, Impeachment of, 

267, 268, 271. 
Warren, Samuel, 534. 
Warton, Joseph, 357 ; his opinion of 

Sherlock, 255. 
Wa^'ton, Thomas, 359 ; estimate of Chau- 
cer, 38 ; of Surrey, 59 ; of Tusser, 59 ; 

of R. Edwards, 81 ; of Bishop Hall, 169. 
Waterland, Daniel, 256. 
Waterton, Charles, 559. 
Watson, Richard, 277, 376, 4S0. 
Watt, James, 419 ; Robert, 494. 
Watts, Alaric, 514; Isaac, 133, 134; 

Thomas, 578. 
Waverley, by Scott, 400. 
Way of the World, The, by Congreve, 

225. 
Wealth of Nations, by Adam Smith, 

350. 
Webster, John, 93. 
Weller, Sam, by Dickens, 524 
Welh'sley, Richard Colley, 500. 
Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of, 

500. 



636 



INDEX. 



Welsh, a Celtic race, 25 , legends, 27; re- 
puted origin from Troy, 2S. 

WesleySf The, 371; Charles's Hymns, 
135; Life by Southey, 3^6. 

West, Gilbert, 222. 

Westminster Assernhly of Divines, 
The, 128. 

Westminster lievieiv, its opinion of 
Banim, 455; of Lingard, 488; of Ay- 
toiin, 517. 

Wlmteltj, Richard, 588. 

WIteweU, William, 557. 

Whipple, E. P. ; his opinion of Fielding, 
298 ; of Gifford, 408 ; of Ebenezer El- 
liott, 449 ; of Browning, 512 ; of Sir 
William Hamilton, 553. 

Whiston, William, 244. 

THiithy, Daniel, 205. 

Tf/iiie, Joseph Blanco, 479; Gilbert, 364; 
Kiike, 383; Thomas, 163. 

Wltite Doe of Mylstone, by Words- 
worth, 449. 

Whitefield, George, 371. 

Whitehead, George, 211 ; William, Paul, 
313. 

Wh Iteloche, Bnlstrode, 159. 

Whiting, 3 o\\vi, 251. 

Whittlnyharn, William, 111. 

Wiffiu, Jeremiah Holmes, 396. 

Wilbei'force, William, 477 ; Samuel, 
Isaac, Edward, 478. 

Wilhes, John, 280. 

Wilkie, William, 314. 

Wilkins, Bishop, 162 ; Sir Charles, 419. 

Wilkinson, Sir John Gardner, 563. 

Wif«ams^ David, 373; Griffith, 175; Helen 
Maria, 429 ; Isaac, 584; ahymnist, 137 ; 
John, 175, 373; Monier, 564; Robert 
Folkestone, 536; Rowland, 585; Wil- 
liam, a hymnist, 136. 
Wilson, Andrew, 243 ; Daniel, 561 ; Hay- 
man, 563; Henry B., 585; James, 462, 



546; Thomas, Bishop, 252; Sir Thomas, 

102. 
Wilson, John, Professor, "Christopher 

North," 461 ; his opinion of Thomson, 

219; of Burns, 329; of Warton, 357 ; 

of Keble, 448. 
Winkworth, Catherine, translator of 

German hymns, 137. 
Winslow, Octavius, 592. 
Wiseman, Cardinal, 581. 
Wither, George, 148. 
Wodrow, Robert, 248. 
Wolcot, John, " Peter Pindar," 331. 
Wollnstou, AV^illiam, 242. 
Wollstonecraft, Mary, 347, 381. 
Wood, Anthony, 202 ; his opinion of Da- 

venaut, 151 ; of Cartwright, 185. 
Wood, Mrs. Henry, 539; John George, 

559 ; Robert, 289. 
Woodhead, Abraham, 164. 
TFord*t<-'«»'f/i,William,443 ; Chi'istopher, 

Charles, 440. 
Worthies of England, Fuller's, 170. 
WottOH, Sir Henx-y, 74; extract, 78; Wil- 
liam, 251. 
Wright, Thomas, 575. 
Wyatt, Sir Thomas, 58, 
Wycherley, William, 223. 
Wyckliffe, his connection with Chaucer 

and John of Gaunt, 35 ; his life and 

Avritings, 43, 44 ; his version of tlie 

Bible, 43, 115 
Wyndham, Rt. Hon. William, 349. 
Wyntoun, Andrew, his Chronicle, 48. 

Yeast, by Kingsley, 531. 

Yesterday, To-Day, and Forever, 

a poem, by Bickersteth, 520. 
Yonge, Charlotte Mary, 539. 
Youatt, William, 474. 
Young, Arthur, 364; Edward, 310, 343; 

Thomas, the Egyptologist, 562. 




s^'-^ 




FOR 



SCHOOLS, ACADEMIES AND COLLEGES. 





INDEX. 



PAGE 

Chase and Stuart's Classical Series, ..... 3 

" " Caesar's Commentaries, . . . .5 

" " First Six Books of Virgil's ^-Eneid, . . 5 

" ** Cicero's Select Orations, .... 6 

" " Sallust's Catiline and Jugurtliine War, . 6 

« " Virgil's .Eneid, 6 

" " Horace's Odes, Satires, and Epistles, . 6 

" " Cicero De Senectute, et De Amicitia, . 6 

'' " Virgil's Eclogues and Georgics, . . 6 

'< " Livy, .6 

Hart's Composition and Rhetoric, ...... 7 

Hart's First Lessons in Composition, ..... 7 

Wilson's Elementary Algebra, ...... 8 

Crittenden's Commercial Arithmetic and Business Manual, . 10 
Mitchell's Manual of Elocution, ...... 10 

Lawrence's Model Speaker, . . . . . . .11 

Martindale's History of the United States, . . . .12 

Webb's Model Definer, . 12 

Webb's Model Etymology, . . . . . . .12 

Hart's In the School-Room, 13 

Longstreth's Young Student's Companion, . . . .13 

The Model Roll Book, No. i 13 

The Model Roll Book, No. 2 14 



The Model Pocket Register and Grade Book, 
The Model School Jj'iavy, 



. 14 

. 14 

The Model Monthly Report, 15 

. 15 



The Model School Pen, ...... 

Book-Keeping Blanks, , . . . , . . .15 




=^^# 






^ ^^^^^^^i/^- ^t 




Model Text-Books 

FOR 

CHASE AID STDAST'S CLASSICAL SEEIES. 

EDITED BY 

THOMAS CHASE, A.M., GEORGE STUART, A.M., 

PROFESSOR OF CLASSICAL LITERATURE, & PROFESSOR OF THE LATIN LANGUAGE, 

Haverford College, Fmna. Central High School, Fhilada. 

References to 

HAEKNESSS LATIN GEAMMAE, 

ANDEEWS & STODDAED'S LATIN GEAMMAE, 

BULLIONS & MOEEIS'S LATIN GEAMMAE, 

GILDEESLEEVE'S LATIN GEAMMAE, 

AND 

ALLEN'S MANUAL LATIN GEAMMAE. 

The publication of this edition of the Classics was suggested 
by the constantly increasing demand by teachers for an edition 
which, by judicious notes, would give to the student the assist- 
ance really necessary to render his study profitable, furnishing 
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1 1 ties of Syntax, &c., and yet would require him to make faithful 
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1 1 It is believed that this Classical Series needs only to be known 

^|5 to insure its very general use. The publishers claim for it pe- 
5P) culiar merit, and beg leave to call attention to the following 
^^ important particulars : 



^^ 3 




The purity of the text. 

The clearness and conciseness of the 

notes, and their adaptation to the 

■wants of students. 
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The convenience of the shape and size. 
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are sold. 
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is the original work of American 

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These books are more largely used in the 



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|w flious 



Band %d\3ot§^ 



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AND ACADEMIES. By Joseph W. Wilson, 
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